Corneal Edema After Cataract Surgery

Corneal Edema After Cataract Surgery. Pseudophakic Bullous Keratopathy. It is corneal edema that occurred as a complication of cataract surgery.© 2019 American Academy of ophthalmology

Corneal Edema After Cataract Surgery

 

 

Corneal Odema is a common complication after cataract eye surgery and most of the time it will be transient and after few days post surgery it will decrease and the cornea become clear again.It is also called pseudophakic bullous keratopathy.

 

Many factors will be responsible for Corneal Edema After Cataract Surgery and these factors are:

1- High ultrasound time in Phacoemulsification surgery. In which there will be shutdown of the endothelium layer in the cornea that is responsible for keeping the cornea clear.

2- Old age patient in which the corneal endothelium layer is not functioning well. The function of corneal endothelium is to pump out the fluid from the cornea and prevent any extra fluid to enter inside the cornea and these two function will prevent the occurrence of corneal odema.

 

 

3- Contact between the probe of the phaco and the endothelium layer. It can be transient or permanent depend on the amount of endothelium cells damage.

4- Previous corneal diseases which affect the endothelium layer.

 

Treatment of Corneal Edema after Cataract Surgery

Treatment of this condition is usually treated by observation. Sometimes in severe cases we can add hypertonic sodium chloride ointment to absorb fluid from the cornea.

In case of chronic corneal odema, bullous keratopathy might occur, in which the cornea will become hazy and there will areas of fluid collection called bullae. The only treatment of end stage bullous keratopathy is corneal graft surgery.

 

 

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