Increasing vessel diameter with the open Y technique for diameter discrepancy.

Abstract

Free tissue transfers have increasingly become the mainstay of plastic surgery for the last two decades. Size discrepancy between the vessels in microsurgery is frequently encountered in clinical practice and may potentially be an important factor in the patency of the anastomosis. A rat model has been devised to improve the diameter discrepancy in microvascular anastomosis. Twenty Wistar rats have been used for this purpose. The external jugular vein was cut 1 mm distally from the bifurcation of the anterior and posterior facial veins. Both legs of the resultant Y-shaped vessel were united after inserting microscissors from one leg and exiting from the other. Performing an end-to-end anastomosis between the vein, which acquired an increased diameter as a result of this procedure, and the carotid artery prepared in the neck, helped to create an arteriovenous shunt. Patency was assessed in the operated rats 2 weeks later. In order to achieve a better understanding of the advantages of this technique, another study was carried out. In this subsequent study, specimens were collected from fresh sheep cadavers, including the brachiocephalic trunk, right common carotid, and right subclavian arteries. Different specimens were compared from each of the vessels and also from each of the subclavian and carotid arteries after they were joined together with the open Y technique and increased diameters of the vessels are obtained. As a result, the authors demonstrated that size discrepancy between the vessels was decreased, patency with a percentage of 94.1 was obtained, and when specimens from the fresh cadavers were evaluated, a reasonable gain was achieved. (p < 0.0001).