Small versus coronal incision orbital decompression in Graves' orbitopathy

Ideally the planning of decompression surgery should be adequate to the severity of the orbitopathy, its possible "lipogenic" or "myopathic" variants, the patient's specific orbital osteology and possible previous surgeries. Due to surgeon's experience and local traditions, however, a standardized rather than a tailored approach is often offered to the patient. An inferior fornix incision can be used for infero medial bony decompression and/or for removing fat from the medial and lateral inferior orbital quadrants. Through the same route a lateral osteotomy can also be performed although an upper skin crease incision offers a wider access to the lateral orbital wall. As an alternative the swinging eyelid technique, offering an adequate access to the bony orbit and to the orbital fat compartments is a versatile technique that can virtually be used as a standard approach for the greatest majority of patients needing decompression surgery. Orbital decompression by coronal incision is an invasive technique and for this not to be used as a standard approach to orbital decompression. Nevertheless, it is not to be abandoned as it can be an additional tool in surgeons' hands when dealing with patients who can better benefit out of a particular, tailored rather than a standardised approach. Many are the circumstances in which this may happen. Major complications associated with the coronal approach have been mainly described in small series, where only a few patients per year were operated. In this respect it is therefore unavoidable to emphasize that each technique has its own learning curve and it may be difficult to differentiate the effects of each technique from the experience of the surgeon.