Abstract
Abstract: :
Purpose: to accomplish survival of ciliary body tissue transplants in the anterior chamber (AC) of a rabbit's eye in order to explore the possibility of replacing the ciliary body in situations where host tissue is not functional, and to determine the effect of immune suppression and addition of VEGF A 165 to improve graft survival. Methods: Outbred female New Zealand albino rabbits received ciliary body tissue allografts obtained from a donor eye and placed on to the surface of host iris. We had four groups: the control group A (n=14), group B (n=3) treated with Cyclosporine A (20 mg/kg i.m.), group C (n=7), where grafts were incubated in medium supplemented with VEGF A 165 during 24 hours and group D (n=4), where all the rabbits were treated with CsA and received transplants obtained from a donor who underwent whole body perfusion with heparinized PBS. Graft fate was first assessed clinically and at certain time points histologically. Results: Control grafts showed black areas from day 2 till day 5 with an inflamed eye. Histology revealed necrotic areas, occluded vessels and haemorrhages during the first 5-6 days. The surviving epithelial cells looked vital until day 12, at which point the whole graft was gradually infiltrated by inflammatory cells. Only Cyclosporin led to histological changes, i.e. absent inflammatory cells, while necrosis was still present. After preservation of the graft tissue with VEGF there were less black areas clinically, but no histological improvement. On the other hand, the whole body perfusion of the donor resulted in earlier disappearance of black areas, and histologically in fewer occluded vessels in the graft and better survival of epithelial cells. Conclusion: Transplanted ciliary epithelium suffers from ischaemic shock and the whole organ transplant is rejected in classic fashion. VEGF does not seem to influence the survival or new vessel invasion of the graft. On the contrary, rapid revascularisation and better survival of functioned epithelium was achieved in immunosuppresed animals that received grafts from whole body perfused donor.
Keywords: 348 ciliary body • 607 transplantation • 317 anterior chamber