A Study Of Incision Width Changes And Surgically Induced Astigmatism After Foldable Iol Implantation In Phacoemulsification

Phacoemulsification is usually performed through 2.8mm clear corneal incision, the outer diameter for standard phaco tip along with the silicon irrigation sleeve is designed to fit snugly into the incision without producing undue stretch or distortion. During the foldable IOL implantation, the barrel of the injector cartridge can cause distortion of clear corneal incision, this will have an impact on postoperative astigmatism and wound healing

To study the change in width of the clear corneal incision after incision creation and after IOL implantation and to study SIA caused by the distortion of the incision

This is a prospective observational study involving 130 patients diagnosed to have cataracts not more than grade III. Phacoemulsification with foldable PCIOL was done in all the patients and clear corneal incision width was measured at two-level at the outer lip and inner lip of the incision. Patients were examined on day 1,15 and day 30 for astigmatism and SIA was calculated.

In this study, there was a change of 0.2mm in the inner lip of the incision in about 50% of the patients. 8% of the patients had a change of 0.3 mm, 36% had a change of 0.1 mm and 6% had no change, when we compared the outer lip 2% had a change of 0.1mm, 15% had a change of 0.3mm, 53% had a change of 0.2mm, 17% had a change of 0.1mm, 13% had no change.

The IOL injector can cause distortion and stretch of the clear corneal incision which may lead to difficulty in sealing of clear corneal incision and sometimes unpredictable surgically induced astigmatism