Myotopography in Tibial Lengthening

Limb lengthening by Ilizarov lengthens not just the long bone, but also the soft tissues too. Damage of the muscles during corticotomy and their stretching during distraction play a crucial role in occurrence of complications and final limb function. We present here a systematic codified nomenclature system of each muscle summarising all the influence that corticotomy and distraction have the particular muscle and demonstrate the same in the setting of tibial lengthening. This scheme helps the surgeon easily recollect what all muscles are involved in what all ways in each level of corticotomy thus enabling him to watch out for complications thereof and monitor and accordingly modify the limb lengthening process. Level of evidence:V