Where Is a Good Place for Uneven Eye Surgery If One Eyelid Has Drooped on Just One Side?

Hello. We are Re:本 Plastic Surgery, meeting you at Exit 1 of Sinsa Station.

No one has perfectly symmetrical eyes.

However, if the difference is obvious enough to strongly affect your impression or interfere with daily life, it is advisable to adjust the size of the eyes.

There is no exact medical term for correcting uneven eyes.

What matters is minimizing the reasons why both eyes differ as much as possible, such as the vertical and horizontal length of the eyes, the shape of the double eyelids, and the position of the eyebrows.

In particular, if the cause is severe drooping of one eyelid, it can be corrected through eye correction surgery.

Eye Correction Surgery

Eye correction surgery is a procedure used for ptosis, meaning when the eyelid droops downward because the muscle that lifts it has weakened.

In cases of ptosis, instead of using the muscle that lifts the eyelid, people may use the eyebrow muscles or forehead muscles to open their eyes.

If ptosis occurs in only one eye, or if the difference is severe, the overall balance of the face can be disrupted due to the movement of the muscles.

Eye correction surgery is basically a method of partially removing and shortening the loosened levator muscle to tighten it.

Depending on the degree of drooping, either an incision method or a non-incision method may be used.

The non-incision method can be used when the eyelids are thin or the ptosis is not very severe.

Because it shortens the muscle without making an incision, it has the advantage of a faster recovery period compared with the incision method.

On the other hand, the incision method is used when ptosis is severe and the eyelid droops significantly, or when the eyelid is thick.

Since an incision is made, the possibility of scarring is higher than with the non-incision method, but at our clinic we provide thorough aftercare, so you do not need to worry too much.

It is best to decide which method will be used after carefully diagnosing the shape of your eyes and the condition of the tissues around the eyes.

Can uneven eye correction be done with surgery on just one side?

Among patients who visit us for uneven eyes, there are also cases where they feel surgery is burdensome and want to have surgery on just one side.

They may think the other eye is normal, so there is no need to touch it.

However, after evaluation, there are cases where correcting just one side is enough, and cases where it is not.

If the drooping is not too severe, does not cover the pupil, the muscle weakness is not serious, and the strength of the muscle on the opposite side is fine, then surgery on just one eye may be sufficient.

However, if there is a possibility that the previously normal eye may droop when only one side is operated on, it is better to operate on both eyes.

To understand why, you first need to know the principle behind opening the eyes.

To open the eyes, signals from the brain stem are transmitted to the levator palpebrae superioris and the Müller muscle of the upper eyelid, causing the levator muscle to contract.

In general, when the brain stem sends signals to both eyes, it sends a stronger signal to the eye that is less open.

If only that side is corrected, the signal sent to the opposite side becomes relatively weaker, causing the opposite eye to droop.

This is called Hering’s law.

If only one eye is corrected, there are quite a few cases where, over time, the opposite eye droops and a revision surgery becomes necessary.

When performing the initial surgery, these factors must also be considered in order to achieve highly satisfactory results.

The difficulty of eye correction surgery that simply strengthens the levator muscle and the difficulty of eye correction surgery for uneven eyes are different.

Please keep in mind that the safe approach is to have the surgery performed by a board-certified plastic surgeon with strong anatomical knowledge of the eye’s function and principles, as well as rich clinical experience with the tissues around the eyes.

Re:본 Plastic Surgery provides patients with sufficient notice and explanations regarding these differences, so you do not need to worry.

If uneven eyes are severe, they can disrupt the overall balance of the face and leave a negative impression.

In addition, functionally, they can create a large difference in vision between the two eyes, so it is best to correct them as quickly as possible.

As with other procedures or surgeries, if you want eye correction surgery because of uneven eyes, rather than proceeding forcefully,

please consult with a board-certified plastic surgeon and receive guidance on the surgical method that fits your eye shape and symptoms.

If you are worried about drooping eyes, differences in eye shape, or uneven eyes with different degrees of drooping, please visit Re:본 Plastic Surgery anytime.

A board-certified plastic surgeon with decades of experience will personally provide kind and thorough consultations for each and every one of you.

Thank you for reading this long post today.