Anatomical description of the perforating cutaneous nerve

The perforating cutaneous nerve/perforating nerve of the sacrotuberous ligament is rarely observed. It usually arises from the posterior division of the sacral plexus or the pudendal nerve and perforates the sacrotuberous ligament. The anatomy of this nerve and its variants is poorly described in the literature, but there are data indicating its role in pudendal neuralgia.

Herein, we present an anatomical study of six formalin-fixed cadavers with descriptions of the topography of spinal nerves S2-S4, the pudendal bundle, the perforating cutaneous nerve and the sacrotuberous ligament.

We found three perforating cutaneous nerves and described each of them in detail, with measurements of length and width, and point of perforation of the sacrotuberous ligament.

We distinguished three types of perforating cutaneous nerve on the basis of our findings and previous publications; two of the three types were observed in our study.