When the doctor reduces the fracture, he will be thinking of several different problems that need to be corrected. When you look at your child's x-rays, you should remember that in order for a fracture to be properly reduced, the bone does not have to look exactly as it did before the break occurred. Usually, you will notice a difference in the position of the bones. Quite often, perfect repositioning of the bones is impossible. Very often it is not necessary, and, in some circumstances it is not even desirable.
Children have remarkable growth rate and the bones can realign themselves as healing progresses.
In such cases, it is often best to leave the two broken bone ends overlapping. Although the appearance on an x-ray of such a fracture is often disturbing to parents, this overlap helps to accommodate for overgrowth and helps to ensure that both limbs will be nearly equal in length when the child's growth is completed. Growth plate fractures, as mentioned earlier, can cause damage to the bone-growing cells, resulting in a growth arrest. When such a growth arrest occurs, it can affect the growth of the entire end of the bone and thus its length, or it may affect growth of only part of the bone, causing an angular deformity. In some cases, it is important to observe the fracture site for months or years to detect a growth arrest, since these problems can be corrected surgically.