Surgical treatment of metopic synostosis.

Metopic synostosis is characterized by keel-shaped forehead (trigonocephaly), prominent midline ridge of the forehead, bitemporal narrowing, bilateral retrusion of supraorbits, egg-shaped orbits, low nasal dorsum, and reduced volume of the anterior cranial fossa. The mainstay treatment is early surgical intervention before the age of 12 months, which usually consists of bifrontal craniotomy with bilateral recontouring, lateral advancement, and lateral displacement of the superior orbital rims. Here, we have developed a new simplified technique for surgical treatment of trigonocephaly. A total of 60 cases of trigonocephaly were operated on between January 1995 and January 2010 by the first author. Surgical outcomes were evaluated 6 months after surgery using postoperative photographs and clinical examination notes, and scaling was made using the Whitaker classification. The evaluation showed that 85% of them were in class I, 11.6% were in class II, and 3.3% were in class III. No case was in class IV. Only the last 10 cases received the new surgical technique, and all were in class I. Complication rate was 38.3% for all cases and was only 20% for the last 10 cases, that is, the new technique group. Revision rate for trigonocephaly surgery was 13.3%, and the most common reason was hardware removal. None of the patients from the new technique group underwent revision surgery. We believe that our new technique is fast and easy, can provide sufficient bone graft, and is more useful for older patients (>1 y). Early postoperative results have been promising.

Distally based sural artery flap without sural nerve.

The distal third of the tibia, ankle and heel area is difficult to reconstruct. For small to medium size defects, local flaps are often an easier alternative than free flap. In lower limb surgery, the sural flap is based on this principle and this flap is becoming increasingly popular. The distally based superficial sural artery flap, first described as a distally based neuro skin flap by masquelet et al., is a skin island flap supplied by the vascular axis of the sural nerve. The main disadvantage of distally based sural artery flap is sacrifice of the sural nerve because it is described the concept of neurocutaneus island flap. We describe one case of reverse sural flap without sural nerve .The aim of this paper is to establish the reliability of this flap even without sural nerve.