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PURPOSE: In extensive deep burn of the lower limb, due to less amount of soft tissue, bone is easily exposed. When it happens, natural healing or reconstruction with skin graft only is not easy. Local flap is difficult to succeed, because adjacent skins are burnt or skin grafted tissues. Muscle flap or free flap are also limited and has high failure rate due to deep tissue damage. The authors acquired good outcome by performing one-stage operation on bone exposed soft tissue defect with AlloDerm(R)(LifeCell, USA), an acellular dermal matrix producted from cadaveric skin. METHODS: We studied 14 bone exposed soft tissue defect patients from March 2002 to March 2009. Average age, sex, cause of burn, location of wound, duration of admission period, and postoperative complications were studied. We removed bony cortex with burring, until conforming pinpoint bone bleeding. Then rehydrated AlloDerm(R)(25/1000 inches, meshed type) was applicated on wound, and thin split thickness(6-8/1000 inches) skin graft was done at the immediately same operative time. RESULTS: Average age of patients was 53.6 years(25 years-80 years, SD=16.8), and 13 patients were male (male:female=13:1). Flame burn was the largest number. (Flame burn 6, electric burn 3, contact burn 4, and scalding burn 1). Tibia(8) was the most affected site(tibia 8, toe 4, malleolus 1, and metatarsal bone 1). Thin STSC with AlloDerm(R) took without additional surgery in 12 of 14 patients. Partial graft loss was shown in four cases. Two cases were small in size under 1x1cm, easily healed with simple dressing, and other two cases needed additional surgery. But in case of additional surgery, granulation tissue has easily formed, and simple patch graft on AlloDerm(R) was enough. Average duration of admission period of patients without additional surgery was 15 days(13-19 days). CONCLUSION: AlloDerm(R) and thin split thickness skin graft give us an advantage of short surgery time and less limitations in donor site than flap surgery. Postoperative scar is smaller compared to in conventional skin graft because of firmer restoration of dermal structure with AlloDerm(R). We propose that AlloDerm(R) and thin split thickness skin graft could be a solution to bone exposured soft tissue defects in extensive deep burned patients on lower extremities, especially when adjacent tissue cannot be used for flap due to extensive burn.
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