Comminuted femur fracture secondary to stress during the Boston marathon

We report a case of a comminuted femur fracture secondary to repetitive stress in a healthy marathon runner. Stress fractures are common orthopedic injuries that result from normal muscular activity on deficient bone ("insufficiency fractures") or excessive, repetitive stresses on normal bone ("fatigue fractures"). Of recreational and professional sports, running accounts for a higher incidence of stress fractures, which have been reported to cause up to 15% of all injuries to runners. We report a case of a sub-trochanteric comminuted femoral stress fracture in a female marathon runner. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc.