Jejunal free flap reconstruction of the pharyngolaryngectomy defect: 368 consecutive cases

The Jejunal Free Flap (JFF) was first described by Seidenberg in 1957 for the reconstruction of pharyngolryngectomy defects. Historically, its outcome profile has been better than alternative reconstructions. Recently, the use of tubed Fasciocutaneous Free Flaps (FCFF) has been increasing as series reporting outcomes superior or equivalent to JFF are published. Our experience with JFF has been more positive than recently published reports suggest. This study aims to provide an accurate and up-to-date assessment of outcomes in JFF reconstruction of pharyngolaryngectomy defects and to compare these results to those of contemporary alternative techniques.

368 Consecutive free jejunum reconstructions were performed for pharyngolaryngectomy defects between 1977 and 2010. All patients had been assessed by a multidisciplinary Head and Neck Clinic prior to surgery. A systematic review of recent literature pertaining to pharyngolaryngectomy reconstruction outcomes was undertaken for comparison with our dataset.

70.9% of tumours in this series were T-grade 3 or 4. Perioperative mortality was 3.8% and flap failure occurred in 2.98%. The incidence of anastomotic leak was 8.2% and stricture occurred in 10.9%. A full oral diet was maintained by 91.6% of patients by day 12 on average. 70.6% underwent primary tracheo-oesophageal puncture and of these 78.1% had effective speech.

Overall, our data compares favourably with other series. The strengths of the JFF reconstruction are the capacity to maintain an oral diet, low stricture and leak rates and the versatility to reconstruct long segment defects. We have observed variability in leak rates throughout the study period, which may be operator dependant. The gap between outcomes for FCFF and JFF reconstructions has narrowed but the latter remains our reconstruction of choice for pharyngolaryngectomy defects.