[Clinical application and improvement of an anterolateral thigh flap]

Since 1984, the authors performed 15 anterolateral thigh cutaneous and myocutaneous flaps with vascular anastomosis and 1 island flap. Among them, 1 failed and 15 survived completely with satisfactory results. The sizes of the flaps used ranged from 6 x 7 cm to 11 x 20 cm. The flap seemed to have a constant vascular anatomy with a long pedicle and a large diameter, so that dissection of the flap can be accomplished easily. The quality of the flap was good and suitable for the repair of soft tissue defect of the hand and foot. In this paper, improvement of operative technique and two representative cases are presented.