Cornea

The Ophthalmos Research & Educational Institute is an eye clinic that has taken an active role in treating patients with Keratoconus in Cyprus for more than 4 years. In comparison with other European countries Cyprus has a high percentage of patients diagnosed with this corneal anomaly. Dr. Tassos Georgiou was invited to present his findings at both the European & World conferences in 2009 & 2010, demonstrating his commitment and quality of care to the treatment of keratoconus.

Keratoconus is a condition of the cornea when it forms a cone. This cone develops as the corneal layer thins. During the development of keratoconus, the patient begins to gradually loose the quality of vision. There are some cases where the loss of visual quality is advanced. The main reason is due to the patients delay in visiting a specialist ophthalmologist for timely treatment of the problem.

The scientific aetiology of the formation of Keratoconus in the eyes has not been verified as yet. It has been found that genetic and hereditary factors play an important role. In almost all cases, symptoms include blurred vision and high astigmatism. As the cone enlarges the optic deformation of the image increases. During the course of the development of keratoconus, if it is not treated early, there is a possibility that the cornea will become very thin until it is necessary for the patient to have a corneal transplant.

Early diagnosis and treatment of this condition is very important. It allows us to stabilise the progression of keratoconus with cross-linking therapy and to correct high myopia and astigmatism, with the use of the technologically advanced Laser. In many cases where early diagnosis and treatment are achieved, the patient’s vision returns to physiologically normal levels.

The treatment of keratoconus over the last four years is done in two basic stages in our eye clinic in Cyprus. The first stage is the stabilisation of the cone with the method of Cross-Linking and later correction of refractive error and the cone, from the now stable keratoconus in order to improve substantially the quality of vision. The therapy of Cross-Linking was discovered by the well known Swiss professor Theo Seller. The method used in the new therapy is a combination of Ultra-violet light after continuous administration of vitamin B eye drops for approximately 30 minutes. The treatment causes a “freezing” of the condition stabilising of the Keratoconus.

Following the stabilisation of the keratoconus, Laser can later be used to correct Myopia, Hypermetropia, irregular and non-irregular astigmatism. This is achieved through the use of the Eximer Laser for keratoconus in Cyprus and the data obtained by corneal topographic analysis, resulting in most patients gaining a good quality of vision.