Background. Peripheral nerve injury (PNI) is a common medical condition. The defected nerve, if not repaired as early as possible, can cause long-term denervation and neurotrophy failure for the target organ. This leads to a series of denervation manifestations, such as muscle atrophy, loss of sensory function, etc. and ultimately, these manifestations seriously affect the patient’s sensorimotor function (Sondell et al., 1998; Chen & Zhu, 1990). Amniotic membranes have been widely used in ophthalmology and skin injury repair because of their anti-inflammatory properties. In this study, we measured therapeutic efficacy and determined if amniotic membranes could be used for sciatic nerve repair.
Material and methods. A post test only control group design has been done in 10 healthy Sprague Dawley rats. In all rats, a unilateral right side sciatic nerve transection was performed and reanastomosed by different methods: Group I (control group): included 5 rats, the anastomosis was done by epineural microsutures using 8/0 nylon. Group II: included 5 rats, the anastomosis was done by epineural microsutures using 8/0 nylon and then wraped by freeze dried human amniotic membrane. Functional evaluation of nerve recovery was done over 3 weeks postoperatively using walking tract analysis and calculate using Sciatic Functional Index.
Result. Functional results showed that there was no significant difference of the sciatic functional index (SFI) between group I and group II.
Conclusion. We can conclude that during 3 weeks functional evlauation, there is no signifikan difference between control group and experimental group that achieved freeze dried human amniotic membrane.
Keywords: sciatic nerve injury, freeze dried human amniotic membrane, walking tract analysis, sciatic functional index.
