Kim's 2010 narrative review synthesizes the etiology, pathogenesis, classification systems, and age-stratified treatment evidence for Legg-Calvé-Perthes disease — asking why the femoral head deforms after ischemic necrosis and what treatments best prevent that deformity across different age groups.
8 years → best surgical results (femoral varus osteotomy) yield Stulberg I/II in only 62%, underscoring the ceiling of purely mechanical containment
When managing a child with LCPD, age at onset is your primary treatment-sorting variable: under 6 years, treat nonsurgically; over 8 years, consider early femoral varus osteotomy before deformity is established, but counsel families that even best-case surgical outcomes leave roughly one-third of older patients with non-spherical heads and long-term arthritis risk.
Kim's 2010 narrative review synthesizes the etiology, pathogenesis, classification systems, and age-stratified treatment evidence for Legg-Calvé-Perthes disease — asking why the femoral head deforms after ischemic necrosis and what treatments best prevent that deformity across different age groups.
8 years → best surgical results (femoral varus osteotomy) yield Stulberg I/II in only 62%, underscoring the ceiling of purely mechanical containment
When managing a child with LCPD, age at onset is your primary treatment-sorting variable: under 6 years, treat nonsurgically; over 8 years, consider early femoral varus osteotomy before deformity is established, but counsel families that even best-case surgical outcomes leave roughly one-third of older patients with non-spherical heads and long-term arthritis risk.