Muscat – A medical team from Sultan Qaboos University Hospital (SQUH) successfully conducted a surgery, the first of its kind in Oman, to reconstruct the fractured floor of a patient’s eye orbit, using a special plate.

The operation was conducted by a team headed by Dr Abdulaziz Abdullah Bakathir, senior consultant and head of the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Unit, in addition to Dr Khamis Mohammed al Hassani, specialist in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Department of Dental and Maxillofacial Surgery.

The surgery was conducted on a young man who met with a road accident and suffered an injury to his eye. His eye plate was manufactured in cooperation with Omani company CureTech. The plate was designed using CT coordinates of the patient.

Then, the location of the plate was planned in cooperation with the medical team through a special 3D technology programme to build the plate electronically and restore the fracture area with extreme precision.

PEEK, a polymer material that withstands high temperatures and chemical reaction, was used to form a prosthetic implant piece in the patient’s body.

It took 60 minutes to conduct the operation, compared to three hours when using a conventional method of repairing the orbital fracture.

The CT scan after the operation showed that the restoration and reconstruction of the fracture area was carried out accurately and in accordance with pre-operative surgical planning procedure. The patient left the hospital in good health.

The technique is deemed an ideal treatment for this type of complex fracture and is approved in specialised medical centres worldwide.