Femur fracture with limb shortening causing occlusion of a polytetrafluoroethylene femoral popliteal graft.

Traumatic occlusion of lower extremity polytetrafluoroethylene arterial grafts is exceedingly rare. We report a patient who suffered a supracondylar femur fracture resulting in shortening of her right lower extremity with kinking and thrombosis of her above-knee polytetrafluoroethylene arterial graft. This is the first report in the English language of prosthetic graft occlusion as a result of traumatic limb shortening. The graft thrombus was successfully lysed by use of intraarterial urokinase, and the kink was repaired by graft resection and reanastomosis. The mechanism of injury and treatment are discussed.