Blood Supply of Extraocular Muscles
All extraocular muscles are supplied by the lateral and medial muscular branches of the ophthalmic artery.
The lateral branch supplies the lateral and superior rectus muscles, the levator muscle of the upper lid, and the superior oblique muscle.
The medial branch, the larger of the two, supplies the inferior and medial rectus muscles and the inferior oblique muscle.
The inferior rectus muscle and the inferior oblique muscle also receive a branch from the infraorbital artery, and the medial rectus muscle receives a branch from the lacrimal artery.
The arteries to the four rectus muscles give rise to the anterior ciliary arteries. Two arteries emergefrom each tendon, except for the lateral rectus muscle, which has only one.
There are exceptions to this rule, however, as any muscle surgeon can readily confirm.
Variations in the number of anterior ciliary arteries supplied by each muscle become clinically relevant with regard to the anterior segment blood supply when disinserting more than two rectus muscle tendons during muscle surgery
The anterior ciliary arteries pass to the episclera, give branches to the sclera, limbus, and conjunctiva, and pierce the sclera not far from thecorneoscleral limbus .
These perforating branches cross the suprachoroidal space to terminate in the anterior part of the ciliary body.
Here they anastomose with the lateral and medial long ciliary arteries to form the major arterial circle of the iris.
The veins from the extraocular muscles correspondto the arteries and empty into the superiorand inferior orbital veins, respectively.
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