TRANSFERRING LATERAL HEAD OF GASTROCNEMIUS MUSCLE FOR TREATMENT OF DEEP PERONEAL NERVE INJURIES

JUN LI^1,2,3,4,5, CHANGBIN LIU^1,2,3,4,5, CHONG WANG^1,2,3,4,5, LIANGJIE DU^1,2,3,4,5, XUECHAO DONG^1,2,3,4,5, YUN GUO^1,2,3,4,5, FENG GAO^1,2,3,4,5, HONGWEI LIU^1,2,3,4,5, LIANG CHEN^1,2,3,4,5, JIANJUN LI^1,2,3,4,5

¹School of Rehabilitation Medicine, Capital Medical University - ²Department of Spinal and Neural Function Reconstruction, Beijing Bo’ai Hospital China Rehabilitation Research Center - ³Institute of Rehabilitation Sciences of China, China Rehabilitation Research Center - ⁴Center of Neural Injury and Repair, Beijing Institute for Brain Disorders - ⁵Beijing Key Laboratory of Neural Injury and Rehabilitation

Objective: To clarify the effect of transferring lateral head of gastrocnemius muscle on the treatment of deep peroneal nerve injuries in rats.

Methods: Thirty-two rats were randomly divided into sham group, control group with injury of the deep peroneal nerve, the neural anastomosis group and the nerve transfer group. We measured walking tracks analysis, electrophysiology, wet weight and cre- atine phosphokinase of anterior tibial muscle, and the branching pattern, length, diameter of motor branches of the tibial nerve in the proximal leg, the maximum dissected length of the common fibular nerve to the proximal and the diameter of deep fibular nerve.

Results: After the intra-neural dissection of the common fibular nerve, the lateral head of gastrocnemius muscle was long enough for direct nerve suture with the deep fibular division without tension. After 12w of surgery, peroneal nerve function index, compound muscle action potential, wet weight and creatine phosphokinase of anterior tibial muscle in the nerve transfer group were higher than them in the control group, but there was no significant difference of them when compare with the neural anastomosis group.

Conclusion: Transferring lateral head of gastrocnemius muscle for treatment of deep peroneal nerve injuries in rats is effective.