title: The anatomical (angiosome) and clinical territories of cutaneous perforating arteries: development of the concept and designing safe flaps.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Island "perforator flaps" have become state of the art for free-skin flap transfer. Recent articles by Saint-Cyr et al. and Rozen et al. have focused on the anatomical and the clinical territories of individual cutaneous perforating arteries in flap planning, and it is timely to compare this work with our angiosome concept.
  
  
  METHODS
  The angiosome concept, published in 1987, was reviewed and correlated with key experimental and clinical work by the authors, published subsequently at different times in different journals. In addition, new data are introduced to define these anatomical and clinical territories of the cutaneous perforators and to aid in the planning of safe skin flaps for local and free-flap transfer.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The anatomical territory of a cutaneous perforator was defined in the pig, dog, guinea pig, and rabbit by a line drawn through its perimeter of anastomotic vessels that link it with adjacent perforators in all directions. The safe clinical territory of that perforator, seen not only in the same range of animals but also in the human using either the Doppler probe or computed tomography angiography to locate the vessels, was found reliably to extend to include the anatomical territory of the next adjacent cutaneous perforator, situated radially in any direction.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The data provided by Saint-Cyr et al. and Rozen et al., coupled with the authors' own original work on the vascular territories of the body and their subsequent studies, reinforce the angiosome concept and provide the basis for the design of safe flaps for patient benefit.
authors: Parkville, Victoria, Australia From the Jack Brockhoff Reconstructive Plastic Surgery Research Unit, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, University of Melbourne.
authors: G Ian
authors: GI
authors: Taylor
authors: Russell J
authors: RJ
authors: Corlett
authors: Shymal C
authors: SC
authors: Dhar
authors: Mark W
authors: MW
authors: Ashton
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001158:Arteries / Q000033:anatomy & histology; D001163:Arteriovenous Anastomosis / Q000033:anatomy & histology; D004285:Dogs; D006085:Graft Survival; D006168:Guinea Pigs; D006801:Humans; D011817:Rabbits; D012867:Skin / Q000098:blood supply*; D013524:Surgical Flaps / Q000098:blood supply*; D034421:Sus scrofa