Seven cases of paranasal sinus diseases leading to orbital complications

Abstract

The eye socket lies anatomically adjacent to the paranasal sinuses, meaning that inflammatory disease of the sinuses can easily cause orbital complications. From January 2007 to April 2008, we observed seven such cases. By category, we observed 4 cases of acute paranasal sinusitis, 1 postoperative maxillary cyst, 1 orbital fracture, and 1 malignant lymphoma. Impaired ocular movement was observed in all cases and 2 patients experienced complications associated with visual disturbance. Each patient was appropriately treated and improvement was observed in visual acuity and ocular movement, except in one patient with malignant lymphoma. Treatment was initially conservative ; surgical treatment was included only if no improvement was seen in disturbances in visual perception. Since visual organ dysfunctions could become irreversible depending on treatment, prompt and competent determination of the treatment policy based on diagnostic imaging and sequential evaluation of visual function is important.