The profile of repeated corneal transplantation
Section snippets
Participants and methods
Eighty patients underwent repeated corneal transplantations at our institute between 1985 and 1998, and all were included in this study. Forty-one of the patients were female and 39 were male. The patients’ age at the primary transplantation ranged between 4 and 83 years (mean, 51.7 years). Follow-up period extended for at least 6 months after the last transplantation. The average follow-up period from the time of primary transplantation until the end of the follow-up period was 89.5 months.
Graft survival
At the end of the follow-up period, 44 of the 86 eyes (51%) had clear grafts, but 10 of them (11.6%) had poor visual outcome because of posterior segment abnormalities. The mean survival period of the primary graft was 14.3 months, the first regraft survived for a mean of 12.3 months, the second regraft survived for a mean of 11.4 months, the third regraft survived for a mean of 8.7 months, and the single fourth regraft survived for 20 months (Fig 2). The survival analysis, as plotted in the
Discussion
Our data indicate that the mean corneal graft survival time decreases with subsequent grafting. The survival time may be predicted for different causes of failure, being very short for primary endothelial dysfunction and the longest for postoperative glaucoma. Postoperative complications and additional intra- and postoperative surgical interventions were associated with decreased survival of the repeated grafts.
The primary indications for repeated corneal transplantation differed from those for
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Orly Yakir, MA, for statistical assistance.
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