Surgical treatment of terrible triad of the elbow

LU Hui; WU Yuan-yong; ZHU Ming

Abstract：Objective To retrospectively analyze the clinical efficiency of surgical treatment of terrible tri-ad of the elbow.Methods Fifteen patients from Jan.2008 to Jul.2013 with terrible triad of the elbow were in-volved into the research and treated with open reduction and internal fixation surgery to repair ligaments at the same time,of whom ten cases were male,5 were female aged from 19-45 years old( average 31 years old) .Early post-operative functional exercises were implemented.The Mayo Elbow Performance Index( MEPI) was employed to e-valuate the efficiency.Results Fifteen cases were followed up for 4-24 months with 20 months on average.All fractures achieved good reduction and the bones healed well.The bone healing time was 12 weeks on average(8-20 weeks).The average range of motion of the elbow was 105.5°,and the mean pronation-supination angle of the forearm was 122°respectively.No complication such as stiffness and iatrogenic injury of radial nerve occurred.Ac-cording to MEPI,the results were excellent in 4 cases,good in 8 cases and fair in 3 cases.Conclusion The terri-ble triad of the elbow should be actively treated with operation to reconstruct the joints and soft tissue.Early postop-erative functional exercise could be implemented in order to avoid immobilization and recover the articular function.