UK Keratoconus Self-Help and Support Association

Hi everybody,
I just stumbled on this great site after doing what feel like an age of research over the last couple of day about cornea grafts.
My apologies in advance for any silly question that I might ask that may have already been covered, I have spent the last couple of hours trawling through threads and have already found a great deal of help / comfort from them.

I first got diagnosed with KC in my left eye in 2003 after being referred to a specialist during a routine eye test. luckily through company BUPA I was seen within a couple of weeks and since have had regular check ups monitoring the condition. I have been told that the speed of deterioration of my eye has been unusually quick. For the last year or so I have had virtually no usable vision available at all only light awareness. I could count finger at the end of my nose but other than that nothing. I did have a spell of trying a RGP lens but it felt very uncomfortable and kept falling out due to the severity of the KC.

Over this xmas my eye grow uncomfortable and vision got even worse, on inspection in a mirror my eye had clouded and looked dull. After a consultation it seems I have now got the next stage of progression where the cornea splits causing what is referred to as "acute hydrops".

I think till now I had my head buried firmly buried in the sand about KC. As far a I was concerned I was blind in one eye with perfect KC free vision in my right eye. Apart from a few inconveniences caused by the blindness life carried on almost as normal (apart from being rubbish at driving and golf) no change really with the golf just a good excuse.

Anyway the long and short of it is I have now decided to have the graft done that I was so desperately trying to avoid. I have been penciled in for mid to late Feb pending on my eye settle-ling down from this bout of hydrops so fingers crossed from this point.

Sorry for the ramble buy a lot is going through my mind right now and I thought putting some of it down in word may assist in getting my head around it all.

Anyway if you got this far thanks for sticking with me.
Regards

Chris

Chris Pope wrote:I think till now I had my head buried firmly buried in the sand about KC. As far a I was concerned I was blind in one eye with perfect KC free vision in my right eye. Apart from a few inconveniences caused by the blindness life carried on almost as normal (apart from being rubbish at driving and golf) no change really with the golf just a good excuse.

Anyway the long and short of it is I have now decided to have the graft done that I was so desperately trying to avoid. I have been penciled in for mid to late Feb pending on my eye settle-ling down from this bout of hydrops so fingers crossed from this point.

Hi Chris and welcome.

I don't think that you actually had your head buried in the sand about KC, more that you had a fear of the inevitable graft - this is expected. You didn't let your KC rule your life and carried on as near to normal (can't use the excuse about being almost blind in one eye for the golf though ) as was possible.

I wish you all the best and hope that the op both goes ahead as planned and gives you the outcome you want.

Karl

Hello Chris

Welcome to the forum!

I have now had two grafts: a full thickness graft in my right eye and a partial thickness graft in my left.

I am sorry to hear that you have developed Hydrops. Like you, I waited until there was really no option before accepting the graft. having had two, I am now a keen advocate of this therapy where other remedies have failed.

I wish you well and hope that you will keep in touch.

Yours aye

Andrew

Thanks Andrew & Karl for taking the time to respond.
Are there many people on this site who have had to have a graft? I would be really intrested in there views (excuse the pun)and would gratfully except any advice for my up comng op.
Chris

best of luck with the op

tim

In the old days, people really only found their way to the forum (I include myself) when things started to go wrong with their KC. In those days, after lenses had failed there was really only an option for a graft.

The forum gave me information about a whole range of lens options when my eyes could no longer take RGP's, so that I was able to respond intelligently when my optometrist (who worked in the hospital) suggested she try different lenses or different lens materials.

When, in the end, my eyes were refusing to take any lens at all, the optometrist took me upstairs to see my ophthalmologist and within six months I had a new cornea in my right eye. If you will excuse a pun of my own, "I have never looked back".

All the best.

Andrew