Consistent and regular daily wearing improve bracing results: a case-control study.

Background: In respect to the prescribed regimen and the regular daily pattern, investigate how short-term results are affected by wear time adherence in terms of hours per day.

Methods: This is a case-control study. The setting is outpatient clinic. There were 168 subjects, all of whom met the inclusion criteria: adolescent idiopathic scoliosis and Sforzesco brace prescription of 18 to 23 h/day. The minimum period of follow-up was 4 months, and the maximum was 6 months, which is the average time passing between the Thermobrace (TB) adoption and out-of-brace X-ray before treatment. The brace wear adherence rate, calculated from the ratio of brace wear time with the prescription, was considered in combination with the daily pattern compliance, classified as consistent (104 patients) or inconsistent according to the abnormal distribution of Thermobrace data. The short-term results were finally explored.

Results: Consistent brace wear is associated with a higher probability of improvement in curve magnitude (OR 1.96 CI 95% 1.22-3.14 chi-square 7.78  = 0.0053). Inconsistent brace wear is more likely to progress (OR 0.14 CI 95% 0.30-0.75 chi-square 10.13  = 0.0015). Results from the logistic regression show that the most influencing factor for improvement is Cobb degrees at the start.

Conclusions: In clinical everyday activity, patients must be encouraged to consistently follow their brace wear prescription, because this attitude is clearly associated with a higher probability of improvement.