The socio-economical impact of paediatric fracture clinic appointments.

The aim of our study was to quantify the indirect cost of a paediatric fracture clinic appointment on society. Our study took place in a paediatric outpatients department using two questionnaires, completed at the time of attendance. The primary measures were days off work and pay lost for the carer and time out from education of the patient. One hundred consecutive patients were asked to complete a after their appointment. Seventy-one were completed. A second clinic evaluation sheet was completed by the surgeons seeing the patients, to assess the appropriateness of the attendance. The results showed that for every 100 appointments 25 working days were lost and 18 people lost pay. Fifty-four days of school were missed as a direct result of attending clinic for review. We showed that 93% of the clinic attendances were thought to be appropriate from the perspective of the surgeon seeing the patient. Streamlining the aftercare of fractures can relieve this considerable socioeconomic burden.