Comprehensive methodology for custom-design and manufacture of soft-tissue prosthesis: Orbital case-study

Facial defects can be critical and emotionally devastating. Loss of an eye is no exception. The development of external prosthesis is a resourceful treatment, which requires the challenging task of obtaining an accurate individualized design. These prostheses are conventionally fabricated by an anaplastologist through a manual, expensive and time-consuming technique. The digital process is an advanced engineering-based alternative that relies on sophisticated computational tools and reverse engineering methods. Taking the state-of-art and the digital process into consideration, this study aims to establish a comprehensive methodology for accurately custom-design and fabricate facial soft-tissue prosthesis taking a 47-year-old woman exhibiting total eye defect, with left-sided exposed cavity socket, was refereed for case-study in the development of an orbital epithesis. A methodology workflow entailing the four main stages of the value-chain is investigated throughout this work, namely: (i) data acquisition, (ii) computational modeling and design (iii) prosthesis manufacturing and (iv) final fittings and cosmesis. The proposed methodology showed encouraging outcomes with remarkable advantages in terms of time and cost efficiency, achieving comfortable custom-fit prosthesis with excellent aesthetic appearance.