Revascularisation of free full thickness skin grafts in rabbits: a scanning electron microscope study of microvascular casts

Temporary Angiogenic Transformation of the Skin Graft Vasculature after Reperfusion

“…These findings contradict the generally accepted delay of several weeks of neovascularization 7 and also the traditional assumption of an early direct inosculation between adjacent capillaries within the wound bed and skin graft. 8,9 Previous studies assumed a simple initial inosculation process between existing vessels from the wound bed with existing capillaries in the skin graft after 48 hours. 13 However, the nature of this process has never been described.…”

“…6 Based on these first results, we assumed an ingrowth of newly formed blood vessels from the wound bed into the graft and subsequent connection to the existing vasculature rather than a direct early linkage of existing bed and graft vessels, as several authors have proposed before. [7][8][9] However, the fate of the graft vasculature has still to be clarified. It is on the one hand thinkable that vessels from the wound bed connect directly to the existing graft vessels without further development of the vascular system.…”

The Effect of Human Recombinant Erythropoietin (rHuEPO) and Tacrolimus (FK506) in Autologous and Homologous Full Thickness Skin Graft (FTSG) Take and Viability in a Rat Model

“…A docking of sprouting vascular formation takes place from the recipient bed which connects to the aforementioned spherical protrusions of the pre-existing graft vessels unlike the previously suggested neovascularization theory which requires weeks to complete. Additionally, there is rather no vessel inosculation from the recipient bed to the graft as it was previously accepted but there is what appears to be a gradual angiogenic response leading to newly formed vascular buds (Goretsky et al, 1995;Okada ,1986;Young et al, 1996). The traditional vessel inosculation theory implies vessel re-formation and lumen restoration of already existing vessels via direct approximation of vessels of the recipient bed and the ones in the graft.…”

Endothelial cells of implanted veins to neovascularize free muscle grafts in a rat model

“…In microvascular casts, Okada [29] demonstrated neovascularization of a free, full-thickness skin graft in rabbits after three days and interpreted his results as visual evidence that, at this point in time, anastomoses between the graft and its bed had begun to form. His finding suggest that the graft's blood vessels survived.…”