Repair of complex foot and ankle wounds with bilateral anterolateral thigh flaps / 中华整形外科杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective@#To explore the clinical effect of bilateral anterolateral thigh flaps in repairing complex wounds of foot and ankle.@*Methods@#From April 2014 to June 2017, 16 patients with complex foot and ankle wounds were treated in Ruihua Hospital Affiliated to Soochow University. There were 15 males and 1 female, aged from 12 to 73 years. Two of them had two wounds for each, the area of which was from 4 cm ×5 cm to 6 cm×10 cm. Fourteen cases were single-wounds, the area of which ranged from 11 cm×8 cm to 42 cm×15 cm. According to the wound surfaces, the wide wound cloth was divided into two pieces of cloth with a width less than 8 cm. The double-leaf skin flap was designed at the point of the perforating branch of the skin flap located by B-ultrasound on the iliac-patellar connecting line of the donor area. The course of the origin artery of the skin perforating branch of the skin flap was observed by DSA image. If the perforating branch of the double-leaf skin flaps was the common origin artery, the two adjacent wounds would be repaired directly. If the perforator of the double-leaf skin flaps is not the common artery, the double-leaf skin flaps were cut separately. After the pedicle division, the perforator vessels of the high perforator skin flaps were anastomosed with the distal end of the medial circumflex lateral femoral artery of the low perforator skin flaps to form a new parallel double-leaf skin flaps, which were then assembled or lobed to the recipient area. Flap donor sites were sutured directly.@*Results@#11 cases were repaired with parallel bilateral anterolateral thigh flaps with double perforators, and 5 cases were repaired with new parallel bilateral thigh flaps formed by anastomotic bridging of perforator vessels. The area of the flaps ranged from 5 cm×6 cm to 8 cm×22 cm. All the 16 flaps survived and the donor site wounds healed in one stage. Five cases underwent internal fixation removal and skin flap thinning 6 to 10 months after operation. Follow-up for 6 to 18 months showed that the skin flaps were of good color and texture, and the sensation of the flaps ranged from S1 to S3. Linear scars were left in all donor sites and lower limb movements were normal.@*Conclusions@#It is a good method to repair complex foot and ankle wounds with bilateral anterolateral thigh flaps, and it has the advantages of flexible design, less damage to donor site and good blood supply of the flap.