Pedicled Vascularized Lymph Node Transfer Treats Lymphedema in Rat Hind Limb: A Simple Experimental Study Design

Vascularized lymph node transfer is a new and promising technique for the physiologic treatment of lymphedema and several clinical and experimental studies have been conducted in recent years. However, the exact mechanism of vascularized lymph node transfer is still unknown. In this study, we aimed to investigate treatment efficacy through the design of a simple and feasible experimental lymphedema model for testing a vascularized lymph node transfer technique. After a pilot study, 30 male Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into two groups and lymphedema was induced in the hindlimb of both groups. In Group 1 (control, n=15) no treatment was applied while pedicled lymph node transfer was applied in Group 2 (experimental, n=15). Model dynamics were assessed with lymphoscintigraphy, limb measurement, and histological analysis. A statistically significant limb circumference reduction at the ankle was seen on days 30 and 90 in Group 2 as compared to Group 1, p<0.05, and lymphatic tracer transport improved in 13 out of the 15 animals in Group 2. A statistically significant reduction in histological scores was achieved in Group 2, p<0.05. In this rat hindlimb lymphedema model, our vascularized lymph node transfer technique is an effective physiologic surgical treatment and represents a feasible experimental model for future studies.