Usefulness of the eyeball exposure area as an eye measurement modality through a comparison between eyes with inborn double eyelids and operated double eyelids

Abstract

Background Many Korean women with single eyelids wish to have their eyes enlarged through double eyelidplasty, and many of them also want to have additional procedures in order to have a larger perceived size of their eyes, with the desire for their eyes to resemble those with inborn double eyelids. Thus, in this study, we performed eye measurements and evaluated the usefulness of the eyeball exposure area to differentiate the overall eye size according to the nature of double eyelids (inborn or operated).Methods This study involved 92 eyes with natural double eyelids (group A) and 76 eyes with only double eyelidplasty (group B). The two groups were compared through measurements of the exposed eyeball area (EEA) and palpebral fissure height (PFH). To compare the usefulness of the EEA for the perceived eye size, the PFH value was also measured by adjusting it to a percentage value.Results The mean value of the PFH was 9.95±0.67 mm in group A and 8.48±1.04 mm in group B. The adjusted percentage value of the PFH relative to the corneal diameter (11.3 mm) was 88.05% in group A and 75.04% in group B. The EEA was 85.59%±3.25% in group A and 82.89%±6.36% in group B. The difference between the two groups was 13.01% in terms of PFH and only 2.7% in terms of EEA.Conclusions The values of PFH and EEA were higher in group A, but EEA was more useful for evaluating the perceived eye size between the two groups.