title: Morbidity associated with anterior iliac crest bone graft harvesting in children undergoing orthopaedic surgery: a prospective review.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Autologous iliac crest bone grafting is an integral part of many orthopaedic surgical procedures. Several studies have documented morbidity and prolonged pain following iliac crest bone graft harvesting in adults; however, in children there is a paucity of information. The purpose of the present study was to quantify the degree of pain and morbidity associated with anterior iliac crest graft harvesting in children undergoing non-spinal orthopaedic surgery.
  
  
  METHODS
  Patients were prospectively enrolled prior to orthopaedic surgery. A patient self-reported visual analogue score was used to record pain at specified time points following surgery. In addition, the patients were reviewed at 2 and 6 weeks, 3 months and 1 year after surgery to record any complications.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Data was collected on 33 patients (34 graft sites). Only one patient (2.94 %) had a complication, namely an injury to the lateral femoral cutaneous nerve. This resolved 3 months after surgery. 89 % of patients had no pain at the iliac crest graft harvest site 3 months after surgery. The three patients who had pain at 3 months had visual analogue scores of 1.0, 1.1 and 1.3, respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This series reveals a very low complication rate and minimal iliac crest graft harvest site pain in children undergoing non-spinal orthopaedic surgery. In addition, the pain experienced is short-lived.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Sheffield Children's Hospital, Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Clarke
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Sheffield Children's Hospital, Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: M J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Flowers
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Sheffield Children's Hospital, Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: A G
authors.initials: AG
authors.lastname: Davies
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Sheffield Children's Hospital, Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fernandes
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Al Ahli Hospital, Doha, Qatar. jonesstan80@gmail.com.
authors.forename: S
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4277-6598
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jones
keywords: Anterior iliac crest bone graft; Children; Morbidity; Orthopaedic surgery