ABSTRACT
Objective To quantitatively study the pressure of residual lateral displacement in distal radius AO C3.1 fracture after manual reduction corrected by dynamic airbag pad using finite element analysis and to verify its effectiveness for correcting the residual displacement of fractures. Methods Imageware 13.0, Mimics 15.0 and ANSYS Workbench were used to simulate 1 cm residual lateral displacement after manual reduction of distal radius fracture corrected by dynamic airbag pad. Then the correlation between the distance of residual lateral displacement and the adjustment of dynamic airbag pad pressure were quantitatively analyzed. Results In the case of constant load restrained by airbag ribbon, during the process of pressure adjustment by splint pad, the stress was mainly distributed in the fracture end where the airbag pad was located. About 2.4 kPa pressure was needed to correct 1 mm displacement on radial side, while about 1.3 kPa pressure was needed to correct 1 mm displacement on dorsal side. The dynamic airbag pad was depressurized after the restoration of residual shift. At this time, displacement could be effectively prevented due to the constant load of airbag ribbon and the frictional load at the fracture end. Conclusions In the case of constant load constrained by airbag ribbon, intelligent airbag splint can effectively correct the residual lateral displacement after the manual reduction of the distal radius AO C3.1 fracture and prevent it from being displaced by adjusting pressure of the dynamic airbag pad.