[Orbital decompression in treatment of endocrine orbitopathy].

Graves' ophthalmopathy (Graves' disease) is a grave, rare immunological inflammatory reaction of the postorbital connective, adipose and ocular muscle tissue. Graves' disease occurs only within the scope of immunothyropathies and constitutes the most frequently encountered extrathyroidal manifestation. Typical symptoms are a result of the volume increase of the postbulbar connective and adipose tissue and of the interstitial swelling of the ocular muscles. Clinically, we find a spectrum of increasingly grave changes in the orbita, such as infiltration of the eyelid and connective tissue, exophthalmos, swelling of the muscles, damage to the cornea and involvement of the optic nerve with loss of vision. Regarding functional impairment of the optic nerve (optic nerve compression), orbita decompression represents an operative ultima ratio. Between January 1992 and April 1997, 11 patients (22 orbitae) from a group of more than 600 patients with Graves' disease with vision involvement were treated surgically. All treatment data were documented prospectively. Surgical intervention was performed only in cases where a progressive loss of vision existed in spite of retrobulbar irradiation and high-dose glucocorticoid therapy. Surgical therapy consisted of decompression of the medial, inferior and lateral orbital wall and of the orbital contents via combined bi-coronary and anterior access. The long-term results demonstrated improved vision conditions with 17 of the 22 eyes operated on. Parameters such as vision, exophthalmos, VEP, motility, double vision and field of vision were documented pre- and post-operatively. The prediction of post-operative deviations of the bulb axis was limited, and these were rectified through secondary displacements of the ocular muscle. No complications worth mentioning were encountered. In extreme events of therapy-resistant Graves' ophthalmopathies with progressive loss of vision, the three-wall decompression method has proved to be the correct one.