Abstract
1. The results of treatment of 186 club feet have been reviewed.
2. Early strong repeated manipulation and splintage produced correction in all, but only sixty-five out of 186 remained acceptable at three years. The other 121 relapsed.
3. Relapse occurred in the first year in eight, between twelve and eighteen months in twenty-five, between eighteen and twenty-four months in twenty-three, and between twenty-four and thirty-six months in sixty-five.
4. Relapse was slightly commoner when treatment began after the first month of life.
5. Relapse was treated either by manipulation and plaster or by soft-tissue correction, leaving fifty-two out of 121 acceptable at three years and sixty-nine which were not acceptable (this includes those in plaster after soft-tissue correction, necessitated by relapse around the ages of two and a half and three and is thus adversely loaded).
6. The three year results in 186 feet were studied: 63 per cent were acceptable and 37 per cent were not. Five year results in eighty-seven feet were studied: 87·4 per cent were acceptable and 12·6 per cent were not.
7. Soft-tissue correction is described. It produced 89 per cent acceptable feet but 11 per cent relapses in 280 operations.
