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One of the other conditions that I deal with on a frequent basis is a condition known as
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thyroid eye disease or Graves' eye disease. It goes by many names – Graves' orbitopathy,
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thyroid associated with orbitopathy, but basically it's an autoimmune condition where the body
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amounts an immune response, an immune reaction to both the thyroid and to the tissues in
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the eye socket. And this can cause swelling and expansion of the muscles and the fat inside
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the eye socket. It can push the eyeball forward and making make the eyelids retract. It can
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make it so that the muscles don't move properly and cause double vision and, in the worst
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cases, it can cause so much pressure in the eye socket that it compromises the blood supply
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to the optic nerves and it can it can cause blindness. Most of the time the condition
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can be treated in its acute phase. It can be treated medically. Sometimes though, such
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as in the case where the optic nerve is being compressed, it does require a surgical intervention
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and that usually involves what's called an orbital decompression where one or more of
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the walls of the eye socket and sometimes the fat inside the eye socket are removed
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in order to create more room inside the eye socket for those expanded orbital tissues
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that decreases the pressure in the eye socket, restores the normal blood flow to the optic
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nerve and and can restore vision to the patient. When it comes to the orbital decompression
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one of the things that I've had the opportunity to utilize technology-wise is a technology
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called ultrasonic bone aspiration. This is a technology that's been around for at least
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fifteen years or so but I've had the opportunity to use it frequently in the setting of orbital
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decompression for thyroid related orbitopathy. And the traditional way to remove bone from
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the eye socket is to use a a high speed drill but the ultrasonic bone aspirator does it
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in a much more gentle fashion and in a way that poses less risk to the orbital soft tissues
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and also to tissues behind the eye socket which can include the lining of the brain.
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I have had the opportunity to use the ultrasonic bone aspirator on a number of occasions and
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that's also a technology that we have available here at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical
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Center.