Lower limb
Medial tarsal arteries
Arteriae tarsales mediales
- Origin
- Small branches of the dorsalis pedis artery on the medial side of the tarsus
- Insertion
- Spread over the medial tarsus and anastomose with branches of the posterior tibial artery
- Function
- Supply the medial tarsal bones and surrounding capsular tissue and form a bypass when flow is blocked elsewhere
- Innervation
- Sympathetic fibres through the perivascular plexus
- Movement & chain
- Contribute to perfusion of the medial arch during weight bearing
- Palpation
- Not separately palpable; assessed indirectly through the dorsalis pedis and posterior tibial pulses
- Clinical
- Poor wound healing after medial foot surgery, osteonecrosis of the navicular (Muller-Weiss disease)
- Segmental innervation
- Sympathetic L1-L2
- In clinical practice
- In foot wounds collateral supply counts: a good posterior tibial pulse can compensate for a weak dorsalis pedis
- Region in the model
- Lower limb