Ankle Fracture Eponyms

Abstract

The acute ankle fracture has often been cited as one of the most commonly treated musculoskeletal injuries. As such, considerable research has been conducted, along with many clinical studies, aiming to evaluate conservative versus surgical management, as well as radiographic classifications and long-term outcomes. Several types of ankle fractures are known historically by their eponyms. Eponyms are frequently used in orthopaedic surgery to denominate fractures, fracture-dislocations, and classifications, which are most commonly named after the physicians who first described them. In 2007, a debate entitled “Should Eponyms Be Abandoned?” evoked strong responses both in favor and against the use of medical eponyms, and added interesting insights into their current use1,2. The opponents of the use of eponyms in the medical literature recommend abandoning them because they “lack accuracy, lead to confusion, and hamper scientific discussion in a globalized world.”1 Some disadvantages are obvious. Some eponyms do not refer to the correct person but to a later researcher who made the same discovery. For example John Langdon Down did not discover the syndrome “mongolism,” but rather coined the term, which was later changed to Down syndrome because the former name was considered racist. Additionally, the person behind a medical eponym might have been involved in crimes against humanity, as was the case with Hans Conrad Julius Reiter in Nazi Germany. Other disadvantages are subtle. For example, pronunciation and spelling may be incorrect. Foreign eponyms that have diacritics (e.g., acute or grave accents) are often misspelled or mispronounced. Sometimes it is hard to establish the exact spelling when you hear someone using an eponym. Finally, an eponymous fracture or classification system is only clinically relevant when it has consequences for treatment or when it influences prognosis. This has resulted in abandoning the scientific use of many of …