Pharyngoesophageal stricture and fistula. Treatment by free jejunal graft

Fifty-five patients with disorders of the pharynx or cervical esophagus requiring extensive ablative therapy were reconstructed by heterotopic autotransplantation of a segment of jejunum. Of these 55 patients, the overwhelming majority were treated for squamous cell carcinoma or the complications of combined radiation and operative therapy. There were six graft failures in the entire group of 55 patients for a transfer reliability of 90%. Three patients died in the perioperative period (5%). The purpose of this paper is to report on the treatment of a subset of these patients in whom fixed cicatricial stenosis of the gullet was the problem or in whom a radionecrotic cutaneous fistula existed. Fourteen such patients were treated, ten with stricture and four with fistula. Both patch grafts of on-lay segments and more routine circumferentially intact tubed segments of jejunum were used depending upon the nature of the defect. The youngest patient in this group was a 3-year-old juvenile diabetic with caustic stricture and the oldest was a 75-year-old man with fixed stricture following operation and radiation for cancer. Nine of ten and four of four anatomic reconstructions were successful in the stricture and fistula patients, respectively. All of these 13 patients with a neo- gullet of jejunum were able to handle secretions and liquids satisfactorily. Eleven patients were on a regular diet and had no discernible physiological impairment in alimentation. One patient had mild dysphagia and used a blenderized diet. One patient was able to swallow liquids only. In this patient the resection for tumor was so high and so extensive that the physiologic act of deglutition itself was impaired. There were no perioperative deaths, although one patient has succumbed to recurrent and metastatic carcinoma. When conventional treatment for stricture or fistula in the cervical alimentary tract has failed, reconstruction can be accomplished safely by free revascularized jejunal graft. Successful alimentation can be anticipated in all patients in whom the physiologic mechanism of deglutition itself is not drastically impaired.