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Do orbital fractures heal on their own?

Sometimes orbital fractures heal on their own, with no lasting damage to the surrounding structures or the eye itself. Typically after a traumatic facial injury and orbital fracture, the orbital area may have significant swelling. This may cause conditions like double vision, reduced eye mobility, reduced vision due to swelling of the surrounding tissue, and pain. As the swelling goes down, these conditions will either stay the same or improve. This is one indicator that is used to determine the need for surgery.

While some guidelines vary, literature states that in the absence of disabling factors such as bleeding, instability of the eye itself, or risk of permanent damage, it is prudent to wait about 14 days before determining if surgery is needed. This gives the fractured area time for the swelling to go down and time to see if symptoms resolve on their own. 

Once improvement stops, it is time to decide if surgery will be needed.

What is orbital floor fracture?

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* Savings estimate based on a study of more than 1 billion claims comparing self-pay (or cash pay) prices of a frequency-weighted market basket of procedures to insurer-negotiated rates for the same. Claims were collected between July 2017 and July 2019. R.Lawrence Van Horn, Arthur Laffer, Robert L.Metcalf. 2019. The Transformative Potential for Price Transparency in Healthcare: Benefits for Consumers and Providers. Health Management Policy and Innovation, Volume 4, Issue 3.

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