Surgery for Duane Syndrome

Abstract

Duane retraction syndrome is a spectrum of eye motility disorders whose common feature is retraction of the affected eye on adduction. The presumed cause is aberrant innervation of the third cranial nerve to the lateral rectus muscle, which co-contracts with the medial rectus on adduction. This article reviews my surgical approach for treating Duane syndrome. It involves the analysis of five aspects of the patient's clinical presentation: laterality, primary position alignment, compensatory head posture, severity of retraction, and presence of upshoots or downshoots on adduction. This analysis allows me to devise an individualized surgical plan for each patient to treat all of the anomalies in one operation.

• compensatory head posture
• downshoots
• Duane syndrome
• lidocaine
• retraction
• surgery
• upshoots