New research has the potential to expand the donor pool for corneal transplant patients.
Many eye banks won’t accept corneas from donors with diabetes, concerned they might be harder to prepare for transplant surgery or are more likely to fail.
But a study led by researchers at Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals suggests otherwise.
The results, published in the journal JAMA Ophthalmology, found no significant differences in patients who received corneas from donors with diabetes compared with those without the disease one year after surgery.
The implication is that the number of corneas available for transplant worldwide could be significantly increased.
Jonathan Lass, the Charles I Thomas Professor in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences at the Case Western Reserve School of Medicine and the study’s lead researcher, said: ‘We also found the severity of the donor’s diabetes did not affect transplant outcomes, and the corneal structure remained healthy across all groups.’
Like a camera lens, the cornea is the clear, dome-shaped window in front of your eye that helps focus light. Vision can occasionally be blocked or distorted by a cloudy, scarred, swollen, or misshapen cornea, often resulting from complications associated with illness, injury or surgery.
In the study, funded by the National Eye Institute (NEI) of the National Institutes of Health, 1,097 patients underwent Descemet Membrane Endothelial Keratoplasty (DMEK), a transplant surgery that replaces the innermost, diseased layer, the endothelium, a single layer of cells lining the back of the cornea that helps keep the cornea clear.
Two-thirds of patients received corneas from donors without diabetes, and one-third received corneas from donors with the disease.
After one year, there was no difference in transplant success between the two groups. The study involved donated corneas from 13 eye banks in the US, 28 clinical testing sites and 46 surgeons. The patients averaged 70 years old.
Kevin Corcoran, president and CEO of the Eye Bank Association of America, said: ‘The DEKS findings are good news for eye banks because they demonstrate that people with diabetes can be cornea donors, increasing the number of people whose sight can be restored, and lives transformed, through transplant procedures.’
