Prevention of overtreatment of neonatal hip dysplasia by the use of ultrasonography

The use of sonography for the neonatal screening of developmental dysplasia of the hip (DDH) results in the overdiagnosis of this entity. In 1994, we examined sonographically and clinically 8,642 hips belonging to 4,321 neonates and found 8,150 hips clinically and sonographically normal, 398 stable but with various sonographic pathology, and 81 unstable with a variety of sonographic pathology. Using an algorithm we proposed for follow-up, and treatment if necessary, we found that 90.4% of hip joints with DDH were spared unnecessary overtreatment.