[Plastic surgery therapy of extensive port-wine stain of the face]

In contrast to true hemangiomas which are vascular tumors, port-wine stains are vascular malformations consisting of mature teleangiectatic vessels in the dermis and the adjacent subcutis. In the case of large facial port-wine stains, no series of patients treated with consistently good results has so far been reported. The patients presented here have been treated by subtotal excision of the naevus flammeus and the resultant defects covered by carefully selected full thickness skin grafts. The results in 50 patients operated upon by this method, and the complications encountered are reported.