Not actually that rare to see. Reabsorption of bone is fairly common place in non unionized fractures that don’t end up getting good blood flow. Osteoclasts will breakdown the bone fragments that don’t unionize, especially if the bone isn’t really responsible for weight bearing.
The only thing thats fake about this is a group of doctors being mystified by any of it.
The only thing thats fake about this is a group of doctors being mystified by any of it.
Sounds more like a teaching opportunity, which was interpreted as an ‘ah, they have no idea what is going on’ moment.
Maybe? But again, reabsorption is so commonplace that it’s not particularly a significant teaching opportunity. I
f we’re assuming that what this person claimed is true, the only real educational thing about this is how important it is to stick to the prescribed follow up care. This more than likely would have been caught during follow up imaging post reconstruction.
My granma had a spinal disc missing entirely. It was just gone. Must’ve broken it at some point and didn’t realize. She was mostly bedridden and moved very slowly with a walker, needed a lot of support. May she rest in peace (death unrelated to missing disc)
Wouldn’t the patient miss the support that bone provided?!
Nah, the fibula doesn’t really bear much weight, it mainly helps with ankle stability and helps with ankle rotation. Things that probably aren’t really a factor after the reconstruction that this patient acquired after their accident.
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First of all, there’s not a lot of orthopedic surgery going on in rural medicine. Secondly, one of my first jobs as a provider involved traveling to provide specialty care to rural clinics and native reservations in one of the poorer states in the union.
You are correct that rural medicine is on the struggle bus, especially in states like mine that refused to expand Medicaid coverage…but your observation just doesn’t really apply to this particular case.
My only regret
Is that I have
Boneitis
oof ouch owie
God dang aliens takin our bones I tell you what
Looks like the person must have lost it in accident that required installing the rod.
Weirdest instance I can think of where somebody lost something important was a young woman doing a bouncy Irish stepdance on a sidewalk above a very steep embankment. Suddenly her phone flew out of her sweater pocket and she back-kicked it over the precipice.
Orthopods stuck the tibial nail in and probably decided that the fibula didn’t need to be fixed because it doesn’t do much so they didn’t bother. The bone then healed as a malunion.
Screws are not supposed to stick out of the bone either right?
You would think, I have a similar intramedullary rod in my leg, and my screws also stick out. Since the screws are there to hold the rod down the inside of the bone in place, they care more about that stability than the screws being a bit long.
I’ve been told that now that I’m healed, if the hardware is giving me problems, I can have them go in and remove it. Unfortunately, being in the US, that would probably be another 15-20 grand to have done (basically as much as I paid to have it put in when my leg was broken). So at least for now, even though I do have some hardware-related pain, it’s not bad enough for me to justify the cost.
Unfortunately, being in the US, that would probably be another 15-20 grand to have done
Fucking hell. I told my doctors that the titanium in my arm was interfering with my rock climbing and weight lifting and they took it out. I think I paid some token fee.
In Europe, obviously
at least we’re liberated now
I’m wondering if it ai generated. The text at the top doesn’t look normal
Edit: wow we’re literally at the point of downvoting people for wondering something?
Looks just like my X-rays.
AI probably stole your fibula to make crappy imitation fibulas!
Or God took it to create another gender. Check mate, evangelicals!
Man, Woman, Roman?🫨
I would assume it was pulverized in whatever accident required the pins to be installed. What’s more surprising than why it’s missing, is why they didn’t replace that section of bone with anything, while they were operating the 1st time.
Fibula does very little. While orthopods love drilling bones it probably isn’t worth fixing that part of the fibula and wasting thousands of dollars in expensive plates.
Looks like someone had some extra parts left laying around when they put everything back together.
Classic fibula or, as we call it, the liar’s bone. Can’t trust it to be there when you need it.
