Vacuum-assisted closure therapy: a new treatment option for recurrent pilonidal sinus disease. Report of three cases.

No single treatment option available for symptomatic pilonidal disease is entirely satisfactory. In our department, we have treated successfully three cases of pilonidal disease with vacuum-assisted closure therapy. We describe our initial experience with this technique. In two cases, the pilonidal sinus was primarily excised, a split skin graft applied to cover the defect, and the vacuum-assisted closure pump applied over the skin graft for a period of four days on a continuous negative pressure of 50 mmHg. The third case was treated and completely healed with vacuum-assisted closure therapy alone. To our knowledge, this is the first report in the literature describing the use of vacuum-assisted closure therapy for this condition. We propose this therapy as an alternative adjunctive treatment for pilonidal disease.