Abstract
Purpose: :
To report clinical experience in best corrected visual outcomes after Descemet’s stripping automated endothelial keratoplasty (DSAEK).
Methods: :
A retrospective review of the medical records of 125 consecutive eyes that underwent DSAEK was commenced. Data collected included patient demographics, indication for surgery, prior surgeries, presence or absence of co-morbid diseases, pre- and postoperative refraction, and pre- and postoperative visual acuity. Visual acuity was recorded in Snellen and logMAR forms.
Results: :
Patients ranged in age from 32-93 with a mean age of 71.05. The majority of cases were performed for Fuch’s endothelial dystrophy (51) or pseudophakic bullous keratopathy (49). Other indications included: aphakic bullous keratopathy, previously failed PK or DSAEK, unspecified corneal edema, corneal edema secondary to a glaucoma implant and Descemet’s rupture. Preoperative vision (logMAR) was 1.152±0.580. The average month of BCVA was 5.735 with a mean BCVA of 0.562±0.449. In a statistical analysis with a paired sample t test, the mean difference was 0.5917 (95%CI = 0.4840 to 0.6995) with a p-value < 0.0001, indicating a statistically significant improvement in vision after DSAEK.At POM2, we found that patients gained an average of 2.056±3.749 Snellen lines or 0.322±0.689 logMAR lines. At the month of best-corrected visual acuity, we found that Snellen lines gained were 4.040±3.694 and logMAR lines gained were 0.581±0.644.
Conclusions: :
Our study documents a statistically significant improvement in visual acuity in patients who underwent DSAEK. Further analysis is currently underway to determine factors correlated with improvement in post-operative visual acuity.
Keywords: cornea: clinical science • clinical (human) or epidemiologic studies: outcomes/complications • transplantation