Surgery

Keratoplasty is typically performed under local anaesthesia. The anaesthetic is hereby injected with a fine, long needle next to the eyeball. Both the eye and the eye muscles are completely numbed by this anaesthesia. Of course the surgical treatment can also be conducted under general anaesthesia.

In a corneal transplant, it is not usual to replace the whole cornea but rather only the central area (diameter of approximately 7-8 mm). A circular incision is made under the surgical microscope using a special instrument (called trephine) to cut out the damaged cornea. A disk of exactly the same size is cut out of the centre of the donor cornea and attached with extremely fine sutures into the opening of the recipient’s eye.