Frontal sinus reconstruction with overlapping sinus mucosa and vascularized pericranial flap Coverage after modified transbasal bifrontal craniotomy: Novel technique and clinical outcomes

Abstract

Background: The modified transbasal bifrontal craniotomy is a variant of the bifrontal craniotomy with a wider surgical corridor than the standard approach. There are several methods for frontal sinus repair in bifrontal craniotomy. This study reports a novel method for frontal sinus repair in the modified transbasal interhemispheric approach by precisely overlapping the frontal sinus mucosa margin (without frontal sinus mucosa exenteration) with packing the frontal sinus with povidone-soaked gel foam and covering it with a vascularized pericranial flap. Methods: In this case series, we retrospectively collected the clinical outcomes regarding cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leakage, meningitis, and mucocele formation of patients who underwent modified transbasal bifrontal craniotomy at Vara Hospital. Results: From January 2016 to December 2021, 65 patients with anterior skull-base lesions were treated with a modified transbasal interhemispheric approach with frontal sinus repair by overlapping frontal sinus mucosa with gel foam packing and vascularized pericranium flap covering. There was no case of postoperative CSF leakage, meningitis, or mucocele formation during the follow-up period of 19.2 months (min 1, max 73). Conclusions: We demonstrated that the modified transbasal interhemispheric approach with frontal sinus repair using gel foam packing and pericranial flap is effective in preventing postoperative CSF leakage and meningitis.

Keywords

• Frontal sinus reconstruction
• Modified transbasal bifrontal craniotomy
• Sinus mucosa
• Cerebrospinal fluid leakage
• Meningitis
• Mucocele