Cemented or uncemented hemiprosthesis in the treatment of intracapsular femoral neck fractures in elderly Review of interesting publications from the 21st century

Femoral neck fractures are common among elderly people. These fractures can cause significant changes in people’s life and many patients never return to the same activity level. For the displaced femoral neck fracture in the elderly the standard surgical procedure has been hemiarthroplasty. It has been debated for years which method of fixation is the best, cementing the prosthesis or press-fit fixation without cement. There are only a handful of prospective studies comparing these two methods and in almost all of them the prostheses used are very old models: Austin-Moore (uncemented) and Thompson (cemented). In this article a selection of studies from the 21st century are presented; also two review articles and the latest updated version of the Cochrane review. The best fixation method for the femoral stem still remains unanswered.