Larger Than Larger: Huge Amounts of Recession-Resection Surgery for Third Nerve Palsy

To describe the characteristics and management outcomes of strabismus surgery in patients with third cranial nerve palsy and identify factors associated with long-term outcomes.

A 10-year retrospective study of patients with third cranial nerve palsy who underwent strabismus surgery was performed at Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, China, between August 2010 and January 2021. Clinical characteristics and factors associated with long-term outcomes were evaluated. Success of surgery was defined as esotropia of 15 prism diopters (PD) or less at postoperative day 1 (POD1) or any deviation of 10 PD or less at postoperative month 2 (POM2) or later.

A total of 91 patients were included, with a mean age of 24.02 ± 15.38 years (range: 2 to 64 years). Forty-one patients (45.1%) were diagnosed as having complete palsy. Congenital palsy accounted for 40.7% (n = 37). Mean follow-up time was 2.50 ± 1.78 years (range: 8 months to 8 years). One-step surgery was performed in 78.0% of cases (n = 71), a staging procedure in 7.7% (n = 7), and reoperations in 14.3% (n = 13). Most patients had supra-maximal recession and resection of the horizontal rectus muscle with additional techniques, including horizontal rectus transposition, superior oblique transposition, traction sutures, and fixation of the globe. The mean surgical dosage performed on the horizontal rectus muscle was 18.52 ± 5.69 mm (range: 8 to 35 mm). Success rates at postoperative month 8 (POM8) were 69.0% (49 of 71) in the one-step surgery group, 57.1% (4 of 7) in the staging surgery group, and 46.2% (6 of 13) in the reoperation group. Preoperative horizontal deviation (odds ratio [OR]: 1.07, 95% CI: 1.02 to 1.13, P = .011), horizontal deviation at POD1 (OR: 0.86, 95% CI: 0.76 to 0.97, P = .016), and horizontal deviation at POM2 (OR: 1.53, 95% CI: 1.18 to 1.98, P = .001) were associated with the outcomes at POM8. Patients with partial palsy had a higher success rate than those with complete palsy (76.0% vs 51.2%, P = .014).

Supra-maximal recession and resection with additional techniques yields satisfying surgical results in patients with third nerve palsy when a larger surgical dose is performed for an initial overcorrection for 15 to 25 PD at POD1. The cases with complete palsy showing a larger deviation were prone to failure. [.