ABSTRACT
Hip fracture, the most serious complication of osteoporosis, burdens lots of costs on any health providing system. Previous reports on rates of hip fractures in Asian countries used to differ a lot. The aim of this study was to estimate the incidence rate of hip fractures in the city of Shiraz, Iran. All operating room logs with the diagnosis of hip fracture were reviewed for hip fractures proceeded by a simple falling down in patients over 50 years, between 21st of March 2000 to 21st of March 2003. According to patients medical records, age, sex, type of fracture [intertrochanteric, neck, subtrochantheric] and patients residency regions regarding to Shiraz municipality division were obtained. The age adjusted incidence rates of hip fracture comparing to the United States population records in 1985. [325.74/100000 for men and 519.05/100000 for women] and to the United States population records in 1989 [384.61/100000 for men and 548.17/100000 for women] was the highest in Asia. The intertrochanteric fracture was significantly higher among females [P=0.003]. The incidence of intertrochanteric and neck fractures were increased with age. In all the age groups, females had more incidence rates of fractures except of the ages of over 80, in which males had more incidence rates than females. High incidence rate of hip fractures in our population especially in our males of over 80 shows that preventive strategies for hip fractures and osteoporosis should be considered in males as well as females. Further studies are needed to find this incidence rate in other cities especially city of Tehran