Endoscopic harvest of four muscle flaps: safe and effective techniques.

The recent explosion of endoscopic techniques in plastic surgery has led to the successful harvest of a number of useful muscle flaps. The gracilis, rectus femoris, external oblique, and gastrocnemius muscles can all be harvested safely and reproducibly using endoscopic techniques. The aim of this study was to identify a safe and effective technique for endoscopic muscle flap harvest. Harvesting the gracilis muscle as a free flap and the gastrocnemius as a pedicle flap lends themselves best to the use of endoscopic techniques.