Abstract:

BACKGROUND: Nickel-titanium shape memory alloys have been widely applied in many medical fields such as orthopedic internal fixation devices, dentistry, cardiovascular materials, neurosurgery, urology, gastrointestinal surgery, hepatobiliary surgery and reproductive medicine.
OBJECTIVE: To review nickel-titanium shape memory alloy in all aspects of orthopedic applications and to clarify the status of its application in orthopedics.
METHODS: A computer of CNKI database (2002-2009) and Pubmed database (1963-2009, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ PubMed) was performed by the first author using “nickel titanium shape memory alloy, fracture” in Chinese and English as the key words, to retrieve articles about the application of nickel-titanium shape memory alloy in orthopedics.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Totally 57 articles were obtained by the preliminary check, the titles and abstracts were screened, 24 literatures met the inclusion criteria were summarized. The results show that nickel-titanium shape memory alloy is not only used for the fractures in limbs, also used in the spine and femoral head fractures in recent years. Nickel-titanium shape memory alloy has good biocompatibility, and super-flexible, low-magnetic, wear-resistant, fatigue-resistant, corrosion-resistant properties, it has been widely used as a new type of internal fixation materials.