Brow Bone Reduction

Q: Dr. Eppley, I am interested in brow bone reduction. I don’t need much so I think a burring technique could be fine.I read on your website that burring doesn’t actually weaken the bone. However I play football for my school and I just want to make sure that I wouldn’t break the bone if I got hit too hard.  Is that a concern I should have?

A: What you undoubtably are referring on my website was that of the skull reduction in general. Removing some of the outer skull bone does not weaken it. But brow bone reduction of the frontal sinus is different because what lies under it is a large air space. Burring of the anterior wall of the frontal sinus probably does weaken it a bit from the perspective of being easier to fracture from direct trauma. But this is not a practical concern since that amount of trauma needed to break the bone would probably break it anyway if it occurred…whether it had been burred or not.

In a burring reduction technique in brow bone reduction, the anterior wall of the frontal sinus is thinned down as much as possible without actually entering the underlying air space.

Dr. Barry Eppley
Indianapolis, Indiana