Surgical treatment of Graves' ophthalmopathy by decompressive orbitotomy.

Malignant exophthalmos is often not resolvable using only medical or radiation therapy. The pressure on the optic nerve which is generally associated with it evolves rapidly in many cases towards optic atrophy and subsequently loss of vision. Only surgical treatment offers any guarantee of success and of the various techniques proposed, subfrontal orbital decompression seems clearly the more effective, in that it makes for an optimal alleviation of pressure in the optic pathways. The Authors describe their technique, a variation on the original approach, and report the results achieved with it.