Challenging Cases in Lamellar Keratoplasty

For the last decades, penetrating keratoplasty (PK) has been the corneal reparative technique of choice, while lamellar keratoplasty has been done relatively rarely. Even nowadays, more than half of corneal surgeries worldwide are « perforating » (PK), while indications don’t always justify to remove the patient’s whole cornea and take the risk of an open-sky procedure.

More specifically, several pathologies only involve the patient’s stroma, and sometimes a part of it, bringing Anterior Lamellar Keratoplasty (ALK) techniques to the forefront more than ever: keratoconus, post-LASIK keratectasia, pellucid marginal degeneration, stromal keratitis, scars, infections, etc.

On the other hand, several pathologies only involve the patient’s endothelium, bringing new light on Posterior Lamellar Keratoplasty techniques, also called “Endothelial Keratoplasty”, with microkeratome-assisted DSAEK and manually-prepared DMEK.

All those lamellar techniques require surgical interventions and equipment that are different from those most corneal surgeons were originally taught with PK, and this webinar provides a complete overview to better understand and acquire those techniques.

Eye surgeons, more especially anterior segment/corneal surgeons