About 10 million people worldwide suffer from corneal blindness. Due to the lack of donors, there are only roughly 100,000 corneal transplants each year. Corneal blindness can be caused by a disease or by an accident. Artificial Corneas are an alternative option for people who are not reliable candidates for human donors. Artificial Cornea transplant is also known as kerotoprosthesis. A person who would be eligible for Kerotoprosthesis is someone who have had a number of failed grafts and someone who has severe ocular disease, including chemical burns, Stevens Johnson syndrome, limbal stem cell deficiency, and many others.
The Artificial Cornea has two parts. "The device is put into a corneal graft, which is then sutured into the patient’s cloudy cornea in a surgical procedure similar to a standard transplant. The AlphaCor is a curved flexible plastic disc; the central part of the disc is transparent. The rim, or skirt, of the device resembles a sponge and acts to secure the device into place by allowing the patient’s own tissue to grow into it and hold it in place." With this, people have a chance to be able to see normally or save vision that is failing.
http://www.cornea.org/index.
http://eyeworld.org/article.
It is amazing how far science is advancing in helping people with corneal blindness. Hopefully they can use this as a base to form other artificial organs.
ReplyDeleteThis article is very interesting because they are essentially curing a form of blindness. When you think of blindness you think of it as something that isn't changeable and here we are giving people the ability to enjoy something we take for granted.
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