Madelung's deformity is characterized by pathology of the ulnar–volar physis of the distal radius leading to cosmetic deformity as well as functional deficit.[1] The treatment of the condition remains a challenge since there is no standardized uniform treatment, and more so, its natural history after a surgical correction is largely unexplored. In this regard, the study by Rus et al delved in to study the same.[2] The study aimed to find if there was any loss of correction over time and concluded that frontal plane parameters remodeled to a certain degree, which was not statistically significant over a mean follow-up period of 20 months.
The study included skeletally immature as well as mature patients. The presence of skeletally mature patients in the cohort could have led to statistical nonsignificance of the frontal plane parameters. The analysis of the data for the skeletally immature patients would provide more valid data regarding the said remodeling, which tends to occur.
Similarly, a very wide range of final follow-up period from 3.4 to 82.2 months has been mentioned. This wide variation of the follow-up period could also have influenced the results. A patient with a shorter follow-up might have a lesser deterioration of the parameters as compared with a patient with a longer follow-up. Analysis of the results at a uniform postoperative period, say 12 months or 24 months, would provide better information regarding the natural course of the deformity after the surgical intervention.
Finally, we congratulate the authors for this study and its results. Research in this direction will be needed in future with a prospective protocol to obtain more valid results.
Authors' ContributionS.B., V.R., and V.K.: critical analysis, manuscript preparation.
Publication HistoryArticle published online:
25 July 2024
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