Stereographic measurement of orbital volume, a digital reproducible evaluation method

Up to date, no standardised reproducible orbital volume measurement method is available. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the accuracy of a new measurement method, which delineates the boundaries of orbital cavity three-dimensionally (3D).

In order to calculate the orbital volume from axial CT slice images of the patients, using our first described measurement method, the segmentation of the orbital cavity and the bony skull was performed using Amira 3D Analysis Software. The files were then imported into the Blender program. The stereographic skull model was aligned based on the Frankfurt horizontal plane and superposed according to defined anatomical reference points. The anterior sectional plane ran through the most posterior section of the lacrimal fossa and the farthest dorsal point of the anterior latero-orbital margin, which is positioned perpendicular to the Frankfurt horizontal plane. The volume of each orbital cavity was then determined automatically by the Blender program.

The 10 consecutive subjects (5 female, 5 male) with mean age of 50.3±21.3 years were considered for analysis in the current study. The first investigator reported a mean orbital volume of 20.24±1.01 cm3 in the first and 20.25±1.03 cm3 in the second evaluation. Furthermore, the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) showed an excellent intrarater agreement (ICC=0.997). Additionally, the second investigator detected a mean orbital volume of 20.20±1.08 cm3 in his assessment, in which an excellent inter-rater agreement was found in ICC (ICC=0.994).

This method provides a standardised and reproducible 3D approach to the measurement of the orbital volume.