TREATMENT OF PROLIFERATIVE VITREORETINOPA THY IN RHEGMATOGENOUS RETINAL-DETACHMENT AND SILICONE OIL TAMPONADE

Purpose To describe out technique of vitrectomy and silicone oil tampo nade for managing retinal detachment and to report the last results ac cording to the posterior and anterior proliferative vitreo retinopathy . Methods A retrospective study was conducted in 108 patients who unde rwent viteoretinal surgery and silicone oil tamponade for proliferativ e vitreo-retinopathy, 64% patients had already been operated without s uccess and 42% underwent vitrectomy with SF6 or C3F8. Diffuse posterio r proliferative vitreo-retinopathy (grade C3-D) was present in 64% pat ients and anterior proliferative vitreo-retinopathy tvas present in 43 .5%. Silicone oil was removed in 79% patients after a mean duration of 6.3 months. II was replaced by 16% C3F8. All patients were followed f or a minimum of 6 months. Results Before silicone oil removal, 55% of the retinas were reattached posterior to the scleral buckle with one o peration, 78% after 2 operations and 88% after 3 or 4 operations. An a verage of 2.1 vitrectomy surgeries were performed. Reproliferation was correlated with the anterior proliferation vitreo-retinopathy (p < 0. 001), posterior proliferative vitreo-retinopathy (p < 0.01) or previou s vitrectomy (p < 0.05). The final visual acuity was 1/20 or better in 61% of the eyes and 2/10 or better in 30.5%. After silicone oil remov al, 8% retinas redetached, 21% of the eyes had hypertony, 7.5% had hyp otony and 7% of the corneas had dystrophy. Conclusion Silicone oil tam ponade was effective for the treatment of retinal detachments with pro liferative vitreo-retinopathy. Since the main complications were hyper tony and corneal dystrophy, silicone oil should be reserved for severe proliferative vitreo-retinopathy cases.