Intraoperative electroneurodiagnostics to detect a second granuloma in the cubital area of median nerves affected by leprosy: a new approach to prevent incomplete surgery.

ABSTRACT

A recent work reports on the necessity to localize the most proximal site of leprous ulnar neuritis with intraoperative electroneurodiagnostics. In the present study we wanted to verify the applicability of this method on leprous median nerves. In six patients, seven median nerves were exposed at the wrist, all showing a typical leprous granuloma there. Spinal roots C5 to Th1 were then stimulated intraoperatively, evoking efferent mixed nerve compound action potentials (NCAPs) which were registered from the nerve's surface. No recordings could be obtained on the granuloma in all patients, neither distally nor shortly proximal from it, nor even further central at the forearm's proximal third where the median nerve exits the cubital area. Prior to dissecting the nerves in this precarious region, they were exposed at the arm's distal third, looking inconspicuous in all cases. Recordings could finally be obtained there, and subsequent exposure further proximal showed no increase in amplitude of the NCAPs, but there was a sharp decrease distally. In all cases, subsequent dissection of the cubital area revealed a second leprous granuloma extending variably from the distal third of the arm to the two heads of the pronator teres muscle, requiring microsurgical release. Intraoperative spinal root stimulation is an effective method to detect a second leprous granuloma and to avoid incomplete surgery in median nerves affected by leprosy.