title: Prosthesis replacement in Mason III radial head fractures: A meta-analysis.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  This present study was to evaluate the clinical efficacy of prosthesis replacement (PR) for patients with Mason III radial head fractures (RHF) compared with open reduction and internal fixation (ORIF).
  
  
  METHODS
  We retrieved the relevant trials up to September 2013 from several public databases, mainly including PubMed, Embase, Springer, Elsevier Science Direct, Cochrane Library, Google scholar, CNKI and Wanfang database. Weighted mean difference (WMD) or odds ratio (OR) and their 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated to compare the clinical outcomes between PR and ORIF.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of 9 studies including 365 patients with Mason III RHF (169 patients treated with PR and 196 patients treated with ORIF) were reanalyzed in the meta-analysis. The results showed that the patients with Mason III RHF receiving PR, compared with the ORIF ones, had a significantly higher percentage of postoperative excellent and good rate (OR=3.48, 95% CI=1.98 to 6.11, P<0.0001), better Broberg and Morrey elbow scores (WMD=9.79, 95% CI=4.22 to 15.36, P=0.0006) and significantly lower postoperative complications (OR=0.33, 95% CI=0.16 to 0.69, P=0.003).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Although the results of this study supported the use of PR in the treatment of Mason III RHF in Chinese population with short-term outcomes, the evidences are of low quality and further studies were required for confirming these results in the longer term on other populations.
  
  
  METHODS
  Level III. Low power meta-analysis.
authors: Department of Orthopaedics, the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, No. 218 Jixi Road, Hefei 230022 Anhui Province, PR China; Department of Orthopaedics, Liu'an People's Hospital, Liu'an 237005, Anhui Province, PR China.
authors: Q
authors: Q
authors: Dou
authors: Department of Orthopaedics, the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, No. 218 Jixi Road, Hefei 230022 Anhui Province, PR China. Electronic address: zong_shengyin@163.com.
authors: Z
authors: Z
authors: Yin
authors: Department of Orthopaedics, Liu'an People's Hospital, Liu'an 237005, Anhui Province, PR China.
authors: L
authors: L
authors: Sun
authors: Department of Orthopaedics, Liu'an People's Hospital, Liu'an 237005, Anhui Province, PR China.
authors: X
authors: X
authors: Feng
mesh_terms: D004551:Elbow Joint / Q000601:surgery*; D005593:Fracture Fixation, Internal / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D019736:Prostheses and Implants; D011475:Prosthesis Failure; D011885:Radius Fractures / Q000601:surgery*; D012086:Reoperation; D000092464:Elbow Injuries
keywords: Meta-analysis; Open reduction and internal fixation; Prosthesis replacement; Radial head fractures