Late Complication of a Silicone Implant Thirty Years after Orbital Fracture Reconstruction

Alloplastic materials used for orbital fracture reconstruction can induce complications, such as infection, migration, extrusion, intraorbital hemorrhage, and residual diplopia. Silicone is one of the alloplastic materials that has been widely used for decades. The author reports a rare case of spontaneous extrusion of a silicone implant that was used for orbital fracture reconstruction 30 years earlier. A 50-year-old man was admitted to the emergency room for an exposed substance in the lower eyelid area of the left eye, which began as a palpable hard nodule a week earlier. The exposed material was considered to be implant used for previous surgery. Under general anesthesia, the implant and parts of the fibrous capsule tissue were removed. Several factors hinder the diagnosis of implant extrusions that occur a long period after the surgery. So, surgeons must be aware that complications with implants can still arise several decades following orbital fracture reconstruction, even without specific causes.