Clinical Evaluation of Vitrectomy with Silicone Oil Comparison of Different Viscosity

ABSTRACT

We analyzed the surgical result of pars plana vitrectomy using silicone oil tamponade and evaluated the effect of different silicone oil viscosity on the result. Of all 66 patients, 48 were male and their mean age was 45.9 years. The most common underlying disease was proliferative vitreoretinopathy (29 patients) and 54 patients (81.9%) had visual acuity of 5/200 or less. Mean follow-up period was 8.94 months. Twenty eight patients had undertaken two or more vitreoretianl surgeries. Anatomical and functional success was achieved in 57 (86.4%) and 31 patients (47.0%), respectively. Complications included hypotony (7 patients), increased intraocular pressure (6 patients), keratopathy (4 patients) and closure of inferior iridectomy (3 patients) on the last follow-up. There was statistically significant correlation between preoperative and final visual acuity (p=0.0001), anatomical success and improvement of visual acuity (p=0.0057), and frequency of vitreoretinal surgery and final visual acuity (p=0.0143). There was no statistically significant difference in the surgical result between eyes using 1,000 cSt and 5,000 cSt silicone oil. This result suggests silicone oil injection may effectively support the surgical treatment of intractible retinal detachment. However, difference of its viscosity seems to make little effect on the surgical result.