ABSTRACT
For years, various types of fascial flaps have been used in clinical practice; however,
there are many unanswered questions regarding their basic physiology, anatomy and
histopathologic changes occurring after transfer. Simple and reliable flap models
are needed to investigate these questions, but very few of these flap models have
been described in experimental animals to date. The purpose of this study was to describe
a new reliable fascia flap model in the dog-the dorsal thoracic fascia flap. This
fascia is defined as the anatomic layer that contains the blood supply to the scapular
and parascapular fasciocutaneous flaps.
Fourteen adult dogs were used in this experiment. The vascular anatomy of the dorsal
thoracic fascia was studied by anatomic dissection and microangiography. Anatomic
dissection revealed that the main axial vessel supplying the dorsal thoracic fascia
was the superficial branch of the thoracodorsal vessel. Based on the vascular pedicle,
fascia flaps generally measuring 15x24 cm were created. At gross observation, all
of these large flaps based solely on the vascular pedicle were observed to be well-perfused.
Microangiographic examination revealed the intense vascularity of the superficial
branches of the thoracodorsal vessels in the whole area of all flaps. It was concluded
that this is a simple and reliable fascial flap model which can be prepared as a free
or pedicled flap. It has a consistent, long vascular pedicle with large vessel diameters
supporting a large fascial flap.
KEYWORDS
Fascial flap - canine model
