[Gold weight implantation: premature and late complications]

To evaluate the indications, the results and the complications seen in the patients submitted to gold weight implantation to correct paralytic lagophthalmos.

Charts of 20 patients with lagophthalmos secondary to facial nerve palsy of diverse etiologies, which were submitted to gold weight implantation in the upper eyelid of the affected side, were retrospectively examined.

The most frequent cause of paralytic lagophthalmos was acoustic neurinoma after surgery (40%). Early and late complications occurred in 40% of the implants. Four patients (20%) presented a local inflammatory reaction in the first 3 months after surgery. Two patients (10%) presented skin and orbicular muscle thinness over the gold weight 4 and 7 years after the implant, respectively. One patient (5%) presented gold weight displacement after 3 years and another patient (5%) had late gold weight extrusion after 10 years.

In this series, the complication rate of gold weight implantation was high (40%). The complications were divided into early, possibly related to the material impurity and the late, due to the evolution of the facial nerve palsy that presented a decrease in muscle tonus.