Title: Intramedullary locked nail for thumb fractures using finite elements

Authors: G. Contreras, M. Cerrolaza, C. Gonzalez-Fuentes

Addresses: Instituto Nacional de Bioingenieria, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Caracas, 1050A, Venezuela. ' Instituto Nacional de Bioingenieria, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Caracas, 1050A, Venezuela. ' Servicio de Traumatologia y Ortopedia, Hospital Universitario, Caracas, Venezuela

Abstract: An intramedullary locked nail for metacarpal fracture treatment has been developed to provide an alternative for standard surgical techniques. It is minimally invasive allowing early post-operative hand movement. A 3D finite-element model was generated. Special attention was focused on the modelling of the thumb. Biomechanical testing and finite-element analyses were performed to determine the ultimate strength and the fatigue behaviour under physiological loads. The FEM was generated from the geometrical model of the nail-metacarpal assembly. Slight differences were observed when different materials were used. No critical stress were found for the |in vivo simulation|. The system shows a sufficient strength.

Keywords: biomechanical testing; intramedullary nailing; finite element method; FEM; metacarpal fracture treatment; thumb fractures; modelling; strength; fatigue behaviour; physiological loads.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBET.2009.027797

International Journal of Biomedical Engineering and Technology, 2009 Vol.2 No.4, pp.332 - 343

Published online: 11 Aug 2009 *

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