Italian Surgeons Transfer Central Retina Between Eyes to Restore Sight
Professor Michele Reibaldi and his team at the Molinette hospital in Turin performed the first autotransplant of the central retina between a patient's own eyes. The surgeons moved healthy tissue from Elena's non-functioning left eye to her damaged right eye, including the cornea, sclera, conjunctiva, and macula. The 67-year-old patient had lost all vision more than five years earlier in a severe car crash. The accident destroyed the optic nerve in her left eye while leaving its structures intact, and damaged the retina and cornea of her right eye beyond conventional repair. The transfer of the entire anatomical block allowed doctors to reconstruct a seeing eye from two compromised ones. Elena recovered her sight after the operation.
The procedure overcomes what surgeons worldwide had considered an insurmountable barrier in eye surgery and creates new treatment options for severe ocular trauma cases that destroy both vision-critical structures and corneal stem cells.
Source: Autotrapianto della retina centrale, intervento eseguito per la prima volta al mondo alle Molinette (lastampa.it). Spotted via Good News Network.
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