BONE FRACTURES

Bret Ford

BIO 120

Spring 2012

• Bone fractures, also known as “broken bones,” occur when a bone becomes cracked or broken.

• Broken bones can be caused by trauma or forceful impact, such as a car accident or an athletic injury, or from disease that degrades the bones.

• There are numerous types of fractures, as can be seen in the image below:

Spiral Fracture

• This type of fracture is commonly the result of a twisting injury.

• The opposing forces from either direction cause the bone to snap.

• More time is often required for healing with spiral fractures than other kinds of fracture.

SPIRAL FRACTURE

Greenstick Fracture

• More often seen in children, because their bones are softer than the bones of adults

• As you can see in the diagram to the left, a greenstick fracture involves a bone being cracked but not completely broken all the way across.

• In this situation, one side of the bone becomes bent while the other side is cracked.

GREENSTICK FRACTURE

Transverse Fracture

• With a transverse fracture, the bone is completely broken, straight across

• The break is at a right angle to the length of the bone itself, as seen in the diagram to the left.

• The next slide shows an x-ray of an actual transverse fracture.

TRANSVERSE FRACTURE

Works Consulted:• Fremgen, B.F. & Frucht, S.S. (2009) Medical

terminology a living language.(4th ed., pp 96-100). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Images Retrieved From:• http://syncmed.com/bone-fractures-the-3-

most-frequent-brings-about-bone-fractures/• http://www.lpch.org/DiseaseHealthInfo/Heal

thLibrary/orthopaedics/0399-pop.html• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Humerus_s

piral_fracture.png• http://thankfulformyhealing.com/diseases/g

reenstick-fracture/• http://www.lpch.org/DiseaseHealthInfo/Heal

thLibrary/orthopaedics/0415-pop.html• http://www.kidsfractures.com/forearm/• http://www.jbjs.org/article.aspx?Volume=8

3&page=1566