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Updated: May 29, 2026
Murine Flexor Tendon Injury and Repair Surgery
Published on: September 19, 2016
Tensile properties of the murine ventral vertical midline incision
Mark A Carlson1, Dennis Chakkalakal
1Department of Surgery, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, Nebraska, United States of America. macarlso@unmc.edu
Background:
In clinical surgery, the vertical midline abdominal incision is popular but associated with healing failures. A murine model of the ventral vertical midline incision was developed in order to study the healing of this incision type.
Methodology/Principal Findings:
The strength of the wild type murine ventral abdominal wall in the midline was contained within the dermis; the linea alba made a negligible contribution. Unwounded abdominal wall had a downward trend (nonsignificant) in maximal tension between 12 and 29 weeks of age. The incision attained 50% of its final strength by postoperative day 40. The maximal tension of the ventral vertical midline incision was nearly that of unwounded abdominal wall by postwounding day 60; there was no difference in unwounded vs. wounded maximal tension at postwounding day 120.
Conclusions/Significance:
After 120 days of healing, the ventral vertical midline incision in the wild type mouse was not significantly different from age-matched nonwounded controls. About half of the final incisional strength was attained after 6 weeks of healing. The significance of this work was to establish the kinetics of wild type incisional healing in a model for which numerous genotypes and genetic tools would be available for subsequent study.
