Orbital tumours in infancy. An analysis of Danish cases from 1943-1962.

A Danish nation-wide 20-year series of orbital tumours in infancy is reported, making up a total of 80 histopathologically verified cases. Secondary tumours were not included except for a few cases where the initial manifestation of the disease was an orbital mass, suggesting a primary tumour of the orbit. A scant half of the series were benign choristomas. Otherwise there was a considerable share of more serious diseases, often threatening vision and/or life; thus ten embryonal sarcomas and nine optic nerve gliomas were found. The malignancies made up a total of 17 cases. Because of the many medical specialities necessary for prompt diagnosis and efficient therapy, a centralization of the more serious orbital cases is feld mandatory. Considering the rather low overall frequency of orbital tumours, a centralization will not constitute a load numerically; an estimate for Denmark (population 5 million) is about five infantile cases a year.