Sternal wound debridement and muscle flap reconstruction: functional implications.

The mortality rate for poststernotomy infection, which occurs in as many as 5% of median sternotomy incisions after cardiovascular surgery, was 37.5% until sternal debridement with muscle or omental flap reconstruction became the standard treatment for this postoperative complication and lowered the mortality rate to just more than 5%. There are few reports in the literature of physical functional deficits and long-term outcome resulting from such reconstruction.