Abstract

Background: Orthopaedic trauma surgery focused mainly on femoral fragility fractures in the   elderly, since the “lockdown” began on March 23, 2020 in our country. Proximal femur fractures carry a high mortality rate due the age and complications. Thus, orthopaedic surgeons face the daily dilemma of performing life-saving surgery on patients who, have severe respiratory compromise, have a higher risk of peri-operative death. The optimal surgical treatment of displaced femoral neck fractures is still debated. Hemiarthroplasty⁴ contributes to early ambulation and good functional recovery. Determining mortality and risk factors for adverse outcomes for patients with COVID-19 and a concurrent hip fracture is of great importance, as it can improve clinical pathways, perioperative management, and resource allocation.
Methods: This was a retrospective study of 10 patients ≥60 years of age with a neck of femur  fracture and COVID-19 who underwent hip  hemiarthroplasty . Clinical characteristics and early postoperative outcomes were reported.
Results: Seven out of the 10 COVID-positive hip fracture patients in our series were asymptomatic on admission with no clinical signs or symptoms of COVID-19 infection. One of the patient had cough and other 2 patients presented with hypoxia. 7 patients was given supplemental oxygen postoperatively which includes the patient presented with hypoxia . 7 patients required post op blood transfusion .None of the patients were put on mechanical ventilation. There was no case of surgical site infection .Average harris hip score was 80 with good outcome . The average length of inpatient stay was 15 days.
 
Conclusions: Our study  shows  that neck of femur fracture patients who present with asymptomatic or mild COVID-19  who underwent hip hemiarthroplasty had a good functional outcome with few post op complications .