Periciliary Epicanthoplasty

Lee, Young Joon

Abstract

Visible scar is the most annoying problem in the surgical procedure to eliminate the medial epicanthal fold, which is a predominant feature among the Asian population. Many surgical techniques have been introduced since the early decades of the 20th century, but the scar problem still has been remained unsolved. If all the skin incision lines were located along the muco-cutaneous junctions and just below the eyelashes, resulting scars could be nearly invisible after 3 or 6 months postoperatively. I think periciliary epicanthoplasty will be the appropriate method to realize this concept perfectlly. From January 2002 to August 2006, 427 patients with medial epicanthal folds underwent epicanthoplasty using a periciliary Y-V advancement procedure in my office and most results have been proved scar free and natural. Surgical design of this procedure is very simple and acceptable to any type of epicanthal folds. Based on my own experiences I would like to offer some tip offs in performing this procedure together with surgical techniques and guidelines.