Traumatic nerve injuries are commonly treated by plastic surgeons. When a nerve is unable to be repaired primarily, surgeons often utilize nerve grafts or conduits to bridge the gap. In this article, a systematic review and meta-analysis of the published results of nerve allografts, nerve autografts, and nerve conduits assisted gap repairs is reported. Meaningful nerve recovery and complication rates for both sensory and motor nerve gap repairs are compared for each repair modality. A cost analysis for allograft and autograft is reported for both the inpatient and outpatient nerve repair setting. Surgeons can use this data to help guide decision making when treating nerve gaps.

Intended Audience
This educational activity is intended for all CME-related persons including plastic surgery practitioners, residents, and other healthcare professionals.

Learning Objectives

After viewing this course, the participant should be able to:

1. Recognize the current available options for the management of short and long nerve gap repairs;
2. Identify the differences in surgical outcomes among autograft, allograft, and conduit nerve gap repairs;
3. Describe the most common complications that occur with autograft, allograft and nerve conduits in nerve gap repairs;
4. Analyze the cost differences among autograft and allograft use in nerve gap repairs in the inpatient and outpatient setting. 

Editor-in-Chief: Kevin Chung, MD

Co-Editor: Amy Colwell, MD

Section Editors: John Y.S. Kim, MD

• Patient Care and Procedural Skills
• Medical Knowledge
• Practice-based Learning and Improvement

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

Designation
The ASPS designates this enduring material for a maximum of 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

AMA PRA Category 1 Credit^TM: 1.0
Media:Journal Article
Release Date: 4/2/2025
Expiration Date: 4/2/2028*
Estimated time to complete this course: 1 hour
*Course access ends on course expiration date

Disclosure Policy
The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) requires all faculty, authors, planners, reviewers, managers, staff and other individuals in a position to control or influence the content of an activity to disclose all relevant financial relationships or affiliations. All identified conflicts of interest must be resolved and the educational content thoroughly vetted by ASPS for fair balance, scientific objectivity and appropriateness of patient care recommendations. The ASPS also requires faculty/authors to disclose when off-label/unapproved uses of a product are discussed in a CME activity or included in related materials.

Disclaimer: All relevant financial relationships for planners, faculty, and others in control of content (either individually or as a group) are reviewed by the ASPS Continuing Education Committee and have been mitigated, if applicable. 

The following planners/faculty members/reviewers have the following disclosures:
Kevin C. Chung , M.D. receives funding from the National Institutes of Health, book royalties from Wolters Kluwer and Elsevier, and a research grant from Sonex to study carpal tunnel outcomes.

Drs. Eberlin, Evans, Mercer, Greenberg, and Styron are paid consultants of Axogen Corporation, a producer of peripheral nerve repair technologies discussed in this review. However, the authors of the article had complete and final control of the data collection, analysis, and manuscript composition. Dr. Lans has no financial interests to declare.

The following planners/faculty members/reviewers have no relevant financial relationships or affiliations to disclose:

Fernando Herrera, MD, Paul Ghareeb, MD, Brian Mailey, MD, Harvey Chim, MD and Josh Adkinson, MD

Recognition Statement

The Continuing Medical Education (CME) credits offered by this activity are enhanced by ASPS Learner Credit Reporting for learners who have opted into this reporting. Successful completion of this CME activity enables active American Board of Surgery (ABS) members the opportunity to earn credit toward the CME requirement of the ABS's Continuous Certification program when claimed within 30 days of completion of the activity.

Participants in ASPS-accredited education who want their CME credits reported to certifying and state licensing boards must opt-in to reporting and add their NPI as well as state license ID and/or collaborating board ID(s) before claiming credit.

Directly provided by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons® (ASPS®)