Thirty legs in nineteen patients, eleven with bilateral and eight with
unilateral chronic anterior-compartment syndrome, were treated by
fasciotomy. In addition, five of these patients (six legs) had compression
of the superficial peroneal nerve: two before and three after fasciotomy.
One patient also had lateral compartment syndrome in one leg. The patients
who had compression of the superficial peroneal nerve were relieved by
partial fasciectomy and fasciotomy of the lateral compartment. In one of
these patients, with bilateral nerve compression, both superficial peroneal
nerves were anomalous. The patient who had lateral compartment syndrome was
relieved by fasciotomy of this compartment. Two patients required a second
fasciotomy due to recurrence of the chronic compartment syndrome. At an
average length of follow-up of twenty-five months after fasciotomy for
anterior compartment syndrome, functional capacity was unlimited or
increased in eighteen patients (twenty-eight legs) and was unchanged in one
patient (two legs) who had had compression of the superficial peroneal
nerve. The intramuscular pressures in the anterior compartment were normal
at rest as well as during and after exercise eight months after the
original fasciotomy in twenty-eight legs and eight months after the second
fasciotomy in two legs.