The rat saphenous flap: a fasciocutaneous free flap model without panniculus carnosus

The rat saphenous flap is described as a new experimental model for free flap studies. This is a fasciocutaneous free flap based on the saphenofemoral vascular pedicle. The flap may include the entire medial aspect of the lower leg between the knee and ankle. Thirty flaps were harvested from 15 inbred rats. Each flap was transferred to the anterior neck of a recipient rat of the same inbred strain so that 15 flaps were vascularized free flaps using the standard end-to-end microvascular technique and the other 15 flaps were nonvascularized free grafts. All but two (technical failure) of the vascularized flaps showed complete survival, whereas all nonvascularized flaps completely necrosed 2 weeks after transfer. It was concluded that the rat saphenous flap has several advantages such as a long and consistent vascular pedicle, ease of harvest, and an all-or-none survival pattern. Furthermore, as a unique feature of this flap, histological analysis revealed that the rat saphenous flap is composed of the skin and underlying fascia without panniculus carnosus. We therefore suggest that the rat saphenous flap is the first true fasciocutaneous free flap model in the rat. In this paper, in addition to illustrating the anatomy of the saphenous vessels and describing a new fasciocutaneous free flap model based on these vessels, we have documented some anatomical details of the rat leg that have never been described in the literature related to the rat anatomy.