Abstract
Purpose: :
To determine the safety and efficacy of amniotic membrane graft (AMG) in glaucoma drainage device (GDD) surgery.
Methods: :
Institutional retrospective case-series of 44 patients undergoing GDD implantation with use of 300 µm-thick AMG as a patch graft. Endpoints assessed were tube exposure, graft thinning, graft clarity, graft-related infection and inflammation.
Results: :
41(93.2%) eyes had an uneventful course over a mean follow up of 21.6±3.2 months (range, 17-28 months). Tube exposure and hypotony each occurred in one eye and were successfully treated with a tube revision using double pericardial and AM patch graft. The translucency of AMG enabled good visualization of the occluding suture when performing laser suture lysis in 16 eyes. Sequential anterior segment OCT showed stable AMG thickness with a change from low to moderate reflectivity in the subconjunctival-graft bilayer.
Conclusions: :
The AMG offers good tectonic support and allows direct visualization of the underlying tube.
Keywords: clinical research methodology • imaging/image analysis: clinical • transplantation