Traction Intolerance Syndrome: A Psychiatric Complication of Femoral Fractures

Abstract

Traction Intolerance Syndrome is defined as a behavioral and/or emotional reaction related to skeletal traction severe enough to require psychiatric consultation and/or the use of major psychiatric medication for prolonged periods in the absence of pre-existing major psychiatric illness. Patients often attribute these reactions to the predicament of traction. This syndrome was present in five of nine patients between the ages of sixteen and forty-five who underwent traction for more than three weeks admitted to the UCLA Orthopedic Service during calendar year 1975. Moreover, all the patients were between sixteen and twenty-six years of age, and all the patients in that age range developed the syndrome. The multiple contributions to the pathogenesis of these reactions are described, and the interventions of the liaison psychiatrist in intervention at the biological, psychological, family and hospital staff levels are discussed.