Preoperative albumin as a predictor of one-year mortality in patients with fractured neck of femur

A simple measure to determine one-year mortality following hip fractures has its benefits. Where there is controversy over implant selection, such a scoring system can facilitate the decision-making process. We undertook a retrospective analysis of one-year postoperative mortality of our hip fracture patients and established their admission serum albumin levels to see if there was any correlation between this and one-year mortality. Our results showed one-year mortality was significantly higher (p=0.0049) for those patients with a serum albumin of <35g/dl. Of the patients with low albumin, we found that there was no statistical significance between one-year mortality and source of admission (p=0.0789). Prefracture serum albumin can be used as a simple predictor of one-year mortality in patients presenting with a fractured neck of femur, thereby aiding operative planning and implant selection with a view to likely survival and possible need for revision.