As you age, your eyesight may start to deteriorate. One of the most crucial parts of the eye is the cornea, which plays a significant role in vision. It is the clear, dome-shaped surface that covers the front of the eye. Any damage or disease to the cornea can cause vision problems, making it important to seek the right medical attention from a cornea specialist.
The cornea is the outermost clear, transparent integral layer located in the front of the iris and pupil. It is responsible for the involuntary eyelids reflex and helps to focus the light on the retina. Any change in the cornea layer consistency causes altered vision. With a decrease in transparency of this layer, blurred vision can occur.
Normally, patients use the words ‘eye transplant’. However, like other organ or tissue transplant surgeries, an actual eye transplant is not possible yet. Even with the help of current modern tools and equipment, eye doctors cannot transplant the entire eye through surgery. It is not possible to remove the whole eye from an individual and transplant it into another patient to improve eye condition or vision.
Common vision or eye-related problems include farsightedness, nearsightedness, astigmatism, and presbyopia. To correct such problems, ‘refractive surgery’ is carried out. The surgical eye procedure helps reduce dependence on contact lenses or eyeglasses. Today, several types of effective surgical procedures are available, but LASIK surgery is the most popular one.
Keratoconus (kerato: Cornea; konos: Cone) is a Greek word. It is a multifactorial non-inflammatory, progressive disease with biomechanical, biochemical, genetic, and environmental pathophysiology. Keratoconus is characterized by a steepening and thinning of the central and paracentral cornea causing myopia and irregular astigmatism. This eye disease affects approximately 1/2000 people of all races and both sexes equally. The onset of this disease is during the second decade of life around puberty. Keratoconus is bilateral and asymmetric ectatic eye condition which progresses until life’s fourth decade.