Peripheral nerve allografting - why and how?

The authors briefly present the methods of reconstruction of peripheral nerve gaps. Of these methods, the reconstruction with nerve allografts is reviewed mainly in what concerns the ways to achieve host tolerance for the allograft. The authors underline the fact that, for the recipient it is better to suppress the graft antigenicity than to suppress the host immune response. Further, the authors present the most important methods to denaturate a nerve allograft in order to make it nonantigenic and insist upon developing methods that can be used in human beings. The authors conclude that reconstruction of nerve defects with peripheral nerve allografts is a very rewarding method that should be extended in clinical practice.