Canthopexy is a small operation that tightens and repositions the outer corner of the eye, where the upper and lower lids meet. It does not remove skin and it does not detach that corner: it lifts and supports what is already there. That single distinction is what separates it from canthoplasty, and it is also why recovery is shorter, results are subtler, and the operation is often done alongside eyelid surgery rather than on its own.<\/p>\n
The word breaks into two parts. The canthus<\/i> is the corner where the upper and lower eyelids meet \u2014 you have an inner canthus near the nose and an outer, or lateral, canthus at the temple side. The suffix -pexy<\/i> means to fix something in place, in the surgical sense of securing or suspending. So a canthopexy is an operation that secures the outer corner of the eye in a better position, usually by placing stitches that tighten the tendon supporting that corner and anchoring them to the bone rim or its lining.<\/p>\n
Almost always, canthopexy means lateral<\/i> canthopexy. When surgeons talk about the outer corner drifting downward, sitting too low, or feeling loose, this is the structure they mean. You may also see the term written as canthoplexy, cantopexy or cantophexy \u2014 these are common misspellings of the same operation, not different procedures.<\/p>\n
The reason people meet this word at all is usually one of two situations. Either a surgeon has mentioned it as part of a plan for lower eyelid surgery, or they have read about it in the context of the lifted, elongated eye shape that social media calls a fox eye. Both are legitimate uses, and they lead to quite different conversations.<\/p>\n