CARTILAGE VIABILITY WITH INTERPOLATED SKIN FLAPS - AN EXPERIMENTAL-STUDY

Although composite cartilage grafts are often used in conjunction with a midline forehead flap to repair full-thickness nasal defects, the t iming of pedicle division, which optimizes cartilage viability, has ye t to be determined. A rabbit animal model was designed to investigate this question. The skin flap pedicle was divided at 0 days, 4 days, 3 weeks, 6 weeks, and 10 weeks in each of five groups of five animals. A lthough early pedicle division led to partial skin flap necrosis, the cartilage grafts tolerated this ischemic period better. Cartilage viab ility was approximately 70% and did not differ significantly between t he five groups. It is concluded that a larger composite graft and bett er definition of the skin flap's critical period are needed to determi ne optimum timing for pedicle division in this animal model.