Broken collarbones (or clavicle fractures) are very common and represent between two and five percent of all adult fractures. Your clavicle is the long bone between your shoulder blade and rib cage that connects your arm to your body.
When you break your collarbone, it often fractures either where it connects to your shoulder blade or your rib cage. This common fracture sometimes happens as a result of a sports injury, or during a car accident, or from a bad fall.
Sometimes a broken collarbone can heal without orthopedic surgery and other times orthopedic surgery is required to fix a broken collarbone.
If your collarbone is broken, there is a chance that you may need surgery to have it repaired. Here are five risk factors that, when present, may lead to a recommendation for surgery on your broken clavicle.
- Smoker (this includes those exposed to first hand smoke and/or second hand smoke)
- Fracture is in more than two pieces: comminution is present which may include crushed bone particles.
- Greater than 15 mm of displacement between the fracture fragments
- Adult, not a child
- Male gender
If the above mentioned risk factors exist, surgery for a broken collarbone is more likely to be recommended as necessary.
The surgery for a broken collarbone involves reducing the broken bone back into alignment and then placing a metal plate and screws into the collarbone.
Smoking has been shown in study after study to impede the healing of fractures. The nicotine and the other poisonous chemicals in the cigarettes interfere with the healing of fractured bone. Not only does it affect the clavicle but all bones in the body.
If the fracture is in more than two pieces it typically means that it was a higher energy injury. The higher energy injuries cause more soft tissue damage and injury to the bone itself so that healing is harder to achieve without the assistance of surgery.
If the fracture fragments are displaced, not touching each other, it is harder for the pieces of the bones to mend or heal back together on their own. Bone to bone contact is easier to achieve compared to fractures that are displaced.
Almost all fractures heal in children or in patients with immature skeletons regardless of displacement or number of fracture fragments. The healing potential in children suffering from a broken collarbone is much better compared to adults or patients with skeletally matured bone.
If you think you have a broken collarbone, you should consult a medical professional like a board certified orthopedic surgeon for a thorough evaluation and treatment. Ignoring this type of injury can lead to further damage and make the healing process more difficult.