Abstract
Background: The blood supply of the hand is complex and challenging. Awareness of the anatomical variationis necessary not only for the anatomist but also for surgeons.The ulnar artery provides a major blood supply to the hand with the assistance of the radial artery in the form of the superficial palmar arch.The objective of this study was reported a rareanatomical variation of the superficial palmar arch.Materials and Methods: The anatomical variation described was found during routine dissection performed by medical students of second semester in a 75-year-old male embalbed adult cadaver in the laboratory of Morphology of the University of Pamplona.Results and Discussion: In the right hand, the superficial palmar arch only gave rise to two common palmar digital arteries. In the left hand, the arch provided common palmar digital arteries which ran into the first, third and the fourth spaces and one proper palmar digital for the little finger. The arch does not supply the second intermetacarpal space.Conclusions: Less critical knowledge of vasculature of the hand might lead iatrogenic injury during surgery, microvascular surgery for revascularization, replantation and composite tissue transfers.Bangladesh Journal of Medical Science Vol.17(3) 2018 p.496-500
Highlights
The hand is supplied by the terminal branches of the radial and ulnar arteries
The blood supply of the hand is derived from the superficial and the deep palmar arches.The superficial palmar arch is an anastomosis fed mainly by the ulnar artery
About a third of the superficial palmar arches are formed by the ulnar alone; a further third are completed by the superficial palmar branch of the radial artery and a third by the arteryradialisindicis, a branch of arteryprincepspollicis or the median artery
Summary
The hand is supplied by the terminal branches of the radial and ulnar arteries. The blood supply of the hand is derived from the superficial and the deep palmar arches (respectively SPA and DPA).The superficial palmar arch is an anastomosis fed mainly by the ulnar artery. Awareness of the frequency of these arterial variations has been observed to be of great assistance in preparation and planning for safe hand surgery Such procedures are prec eded by arterial cannulation in order to determine the exact vascular pattern and minimize any potential tissue damage[4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11].The objective of this paper was described a rare anatomical variation in the pattern of the superficial palmar arch. The arch only gave rise to two common palmar digital arteries what supply the medial and the lateral sides of the third and fourth intermetacarpal space and the lateral side of little finger, lateral and medial side of the ring finger and the medial side middle finger It was not formed the proper digital branch to the ulnar side of little finger. The arch does not supply the second intermetacarpal space and the medial sides of the index finger and lateral sides of the middle finger which are supply for the deep palmar arch.Figure
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