The pudendal nerve is a mixed nerve of the sacral plexus, usually receiving fibers associated with S2–S4 spinal nerves. It carries sensory information from much of the perineum and motor signals to skeletal muscles involved in continence, including the external anal sphincter and external urethral sphincter. Its route includes the pudendal canal.
A description of anatomy is a pattern with variation, not a guarantee that every individual has identical branching. Dissection of 28 cadavers documented additional branches and interconnections near the external anal sphincter in some specimens.[ref]
Anatomy of the pudendal nerve and its terminal branches: a cadaver study by Steven E. Schraffordt and others. ANZ Journal of Surgery 74, pp. 23–26; observed branching and interconnecting nerve plexuses
The study also illustrates the difference between a skeletal muscle being structurally intact and its nerve supply being intact: coordinated contraction depends on both the skeletal muscle and the arriving motor signals. Articles by others on the same topic
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