Table 2.
Union rates and pain post treatment with operative versus non-operative treatment
| Authors | Year of publication | Number of patients evaluated | Union op. (n)/total op. | Union non-op. (n)/total non-op. | Pain at final f/u op. | Pain at final f/u non-op. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ip and Tsang [112] | 2007 | 24 | 17/20 (85%) | 3/4c (75%) | No data | No data |
| Haxhija et al. [108] | 2006 | 14 | 14/14 | N/A all had op. | 0/14 | N/A all had op. |
| Lee HH et al. [109] | 2005 | 25 | 25/25 (100%) | N/A all had op. | 0/25 | N/A all had op. |
| Farsetti et al. [10] | 2001 | 42 | 17/17a (100%) | 2/19 (10.5%) | 5/23 | 1/19 |
| Pimpalnerkar et al. [114] | 1998 | 14 | 6/14 (43%) | N/A all had op. | 0/14 | N/A all had op. |
| Duun et al. [7] | 1994 | 33 | 30/33 (91%) | N/A all had op. | 10/33 | N/A all had op. |
| Skak et al. [110] | 1994 | 24 | 20/21 (95%) | 0/3 (0%) | No data | No data |
| Fowles et al. [5] | 1990 | 28 | 8/9 (89%) | 13/19 (68.4%) | 0/9 | 0/19 |
| Wilson et al. [12] | 1988 | 43 | 20/23 (87%) | 11/20 (55%) | 9/23 | 1/20 |
| Hines et al. [6] | 1987 | 31 | 30/31 (97%) | N/A all had op. | 8/31b | N/A all had op. |
| Dias et al. [11] | 1987 | 20 | N/A all had non-op. | 0/20 (0%) | N/A all had non-op. | 1/20 |
| van Niekerk and Severijnen [111] | 1985 | 20 | 10/11 (91%) | 8/9 (89%) | 5/11 | 2/9 |
| Papavasiliou and Crawford [113] | 1982 | 91 | 63/63 (100%) | 23/28 | 0/63 | 5/28 |
| Bede et al. [3] | 1975 | 50 | No datad | No datad | No datad | No datad |
| Summary statistics | 260/281 (92.5%) | 60/122 (49.2%) | 37/246 (15.0%) | 10/115 (8.7%) | ||
| Adjusted statistics | DerSimonian Laird OR (95% CI) | 9.33 (2.54, 34.29)e | DerSimonian Laird OR (95% CI) | 1.87 (0.21, 16.37)f |
aThe six patients who were treated with excision of the fragment were eliminated because union was not a goal for this surgery and there was nothing to unite
bTwelve patients in this study were not examined in person, but instead filled out questionnaires
cOne patient was initially assigned to the operative group based on displacement but refused surgery
d51.6% of patients had non-union, but were not broken down into operative and non-operative. 2% of patients had tenderness; no data for pain
eBased on seven studies that had both operative and non-operative patients with union data, random effects cumulative model
fBased on five studies that had data, random effects model