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19.11.2018 18:46:22
Ophthalmologists at the University Hospital Knappschaftskrankenhaus Bochum in Germany are the first medical team worldwide to successfully apply a new surgical method in children with a congenital cataract. The team around Prof. Dr. med. Burkhard Dick has operated with the Catalys femtosecond laser so far twelve toddlers whose vision was severely endangered by a haze of the eye lens. A first scientific report on the new method is due to be published in the Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery.
Usually people in the second half of life usually get cataracts, but cataracts can also be innate. Three out of every 10,000 children are born with a clouded eye lens. In order for the affected eye to be able to develop its full eyesight, children are being treated as early as possible. The special femtosecond laser has been used successfully in adult cataract surgery in Bochum for one and a half years, and important sections of the procedure are safer and more precise than before by hand and scalpel.
This benefits the toddlers now. Even experienced surgeons often have problems to manually create a circular opening of the lens capsule to then - as in the operation of an adult patient - the turbid lens with ultrasound to crush and aspirate. This is not a problem for the computer-controlled infrared laser. "The precision of this opening of the lens capsule, the so-called capsulotomy," stresses Professor Dr. med. Burkhard Dick, "is crucial for the success of the operation and thus for the development of vision in these children. The refractive power of the lens is initially taken over by a contact lens in small children, which is usually very well tolerated. Shortly before enrollment, when the eye is fully grown, a modern intraocular lens can be implanted that stays in sight for life. For most of our patients, I expect largely normal vision. "
The femtosecond laser cuts with a spot size of one hundredth of a millimeter more accurate than any microsurgical scalpel, the tissue is divided exactly and gently; the healing goes very fast after an intervention with the femtosecond laser. At the University Eye Hospital, cataract surgery is one of the most common treatments with almost 4,000 procedures a year.
