A cheek pads to support eyeglasses after rhinoplasty

Protecting the nose after rhinoplasty is not limited to just the splinting periods. We recommend a cheek pads for patients who wear eyeglasses not to support the pedestals of the glasses upon the nose after rhinoplasty.

After rhinoplasty, external rigid fixation of the osteotomy sites takes place in the first week by several methods, such as plaster of Paris bandages or Denver nasal splints. Although the use of external taping does not have a splinting effect on the underlying skeletal or cartilaginous structure, it usually goes on through the postoperative second week until fibrous union begins. The overall healing period of osteotomized bones after rhinoplasty lasts for several weeks. During this period, to avoid any trauma, body contact sports such as boxing, soccer, volleyball, basketball, karate, hockey, and football are limited. In addition, the patients are discouraged from wearing glasses to prevent any undesired deformation of the newly reconstructed nose. Although there is an alternative method of vision correction-the use of contact lenses- there may be intolerance or contraindications in the use of contact lenses for some patients, who need to wear glasses. The restriction of wearing glasses causes a problem in profession and lack of comfort in daily life for those patients.

Even though lightweight frames for glasses and soft pedestals may available, the pressure of particularly thick glasses with a high number of dioptrics may cause an irritation on the skin and a deformation on the regenerating bones in the early post-rhinoplasty periods.

We designed a new eyeglasses with a cheek pads to place on the malar eminences. Our eyeglasses are similar to an ordinary eyeglasses except the cheek pads. It is light, thin, and strong. It spreads the weight of the glasses to the malar eminences.