Lasik, then 360 complete retinal detachment

This is the eye of a patient who underwent LASIK surgery in 2001. Several years later this patient suffered a 360 complete retinal detachment. This resulted in a blind eye without any light perception. About 9 years later the LASIK flap split apart separating the anterior cornea from the underlying corneal tissue. As if this was not enough damage for this eye to endure, the outer cellular layer of the cornea (the epithelium) began to separate from the underlying cornea. Because of all the damage that took place, the cornea became opaque and filled with scar tissue and blood vessels. The photo below shows how this cornea looked when this patient first presented at my office. The 2nd image was taken with a technology known as “optical coherence tomography” or “OCT”. In this image note the curved horizontal line extending across the cornea. Also note the bubble-like appearance to the corneal surface. This is the epithelium separating from the underlying tissue. To eliminate the pain, we fit this eye with a gas permeable scleral lens. The top 2 curved lines represent the front and back surface of the scleral lens. For the past 3 years, this patient has been wearing his scleral lens on a daily basis over this blind eye and has not experienced pain while the lens is on his eye. In my opinion, without having seen you, the pain you are experiencing may be due to the damaged cornea. If this is the case, a well fit scleral lens can help you deal with the pain.