[Surgical management of frontobasal defects by a transcranial subfrontal approach]

On hand of 43 patients who underwent surgical closure of the rhino-frontobasis because of lesions in this localization (38 frontobasal fractures, 2 encephaloceles, 3 defects after surgery of olfactorius-meningeomas) our experiences as well as indications and techniques of the transcranial-subfrontal approach are reported. As there was quite a high number of patients in this group (n = 23, 53%) who - retrospectively - suffered of at least one severe meningitis, the authors stress their opinion that the indication for surgical procedure should be affirmed as consistently as possible, especially in cases were primary rhino-liquorrheas have stopped and bony defects have not been verified in predelective localizations.