The Frequency of Palmaris Longus and Plantaris Muscles in an Urban Population: Clinical Relevance for Reconstructive Surgical Procedures

The surgeon's preference of selection for tendon utilization in reconstructive surgery involves choosing palmaris longus and/or plantaris muscles as these tendinous structures offer satisfactory length and tensile strength properties. Recovery of these muscle (MM) tendons has been applied in craniofacial plastic and cosmetic surgeries that involve repair of congenital ptosis, lip augmentation and joint reinforcement. This study tracks presence/absence (P/A) of these MMs and explores whether the P/A of one MM can reliably predict the P/A on its contralateral side. Donor specimens (n=68) from the Downstate anatomy programs were used. Authors assessed the presence and absence of these MMs noting anatomical architecture, sex, and ethnicity. Results from our sample showed a 23.7% absence of palmaris longus and a 16.9% absence of plantaris. A significant concordance was found between left and right palmaris longus and left and right plantaris yielding Kappa values of 0.5317 and 0.3980, respectively. There was a greater percentage of absence from upper limb regions than from lower limb regions. There were no significant differences with respect to sex, although only females had an absence of all four MMs. The high frequency of absence in upper limbs over lower limbs may be indicative of an evolutionary trend as the lower extremity may be more highly conserved developmentally in contrast to the upper extremity.