Treatment of Chronic Nonunion of a Sternal Fracture With Bone Morphogenetic Protein

Morgan, Anthony MA, FRCS

Department of Thoracic Surgery, Bristol Royal Infirmary, Bristol, United Kingdom

accepted November 5, 2007

^*Address correspondence to Dr Morgan, Department of Thoracic Surgery, Bristol Royal Infirmary, Marlborough St, Bristol, BS2 8HW, United Kingdom

[email protected]

The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 85(2):p e12-e13, February 2008.

Chronic nonunion of sternal fractures, up until now, has been treated by osteosynthetic plating with or without autologous bone grafting. A new technique is described involving the use of bone morphogenic protein to stimulate bone growth at the fracture site, thereby eliminating the need for bone grafting.