UK Keratoconus Self-Help and Support Association

what are the major and minor causes of keratoconus?

Nobody really knows the cause of keratoconus- there are many different theories. I think around 8% of KC sufferers are related to someone else who has keratoconus.

It is being more widely accepted that it is genetic but not simple genetics. There has to be a coming together of a certain set of recessive genes to give a predisposition to KC which is why it can appear where there is no other history or just disapear where it has been present for a few generations.

Many will say dry eyes or eye rubbing, but these are considerd more as a symptom of an eye condition and probably not KC!

Hi there,
i am new to this group and might be seeing some of you possibly at Moorfields on Saturday 21st October.
I have been looking into this whole issue of the underlying cause for close to 2 years now, especially over the last 9 months since I have taken a sabbatical for health reasons.
This is a pretty long story so bear with me!

There are suggestions that genetic predisposition might be a factor. Whilst neither of my parents nor grandparents have it, i can't discount it. However, there are some suggestions that it might be also triggered by pathogens or have an alternative biochemical foundation. In my case this is more possible: I had a severe case of salmonella at 16 (I am now 32, having lived for 14 years with KC). and shortly after my 18th birthday, I was diagnosed with KC and immediately put on rigid gas semi-permeable lenses. I have constantly had issues with the comfort (scratching, notably) of the lenses - however, since 2000, I started to develop serious health complications - head pressures, severe stomach as well as muscular spasms, irritable bowel, etc. and was ultimately in a state of increasing chronic fatigue. I was given the run-around between GPs, a neurologist and a gastroentereologist, until I got to a homeopathic physician and nutritionist where I started to unravel the totality of the issues involved. Suffice to say, I identified a severe mineral imbalance and toxic overload with a catastrophic yeast (candida) overgrowth.

A recommended course of action included a severe diet cutting anything with sugar (manufactured or natural) as well as yeast for pretty much the whole of last year has led to improvements in my overall health. And moreover slightly to my vision in terms of the strength of visual correction needed in my lenses.

In talking to medical and nutritional experts, it has been suggested that the salmonella might have triggered the whole avalanche, especially if i had a predisposition to suffering badly from pathogens, but nobody can be sure. However, there are some suggestions that there is a viable theory here. To understand why, you have to understand biochemistry, although alot of doctors still dispute the whole idea.
From what I understand, candida is one of the bacterial tools that the body uses against pathogens and outside "invaders". It is for this reason that the use of antibiotics or introduction of pathogens such as salmonella or e coli can also trigger extreme levels of candida development in order to destroy the outside forces. The problem however may arise that the candida itself then gets overgrown to such an extent and becomes a destructive force in its own right by feeding on the nutrition which you are taking in - thus preventing the body from drawing the benefits it would otherwise, with the long terms consequences of a chronic mineral imbalance. However, this overriding of the equilibrium in the gut may additionally lead to toxic overload which itself can trigger depression, fatigue and the like. Because the more your gut's functioning is depleted, the less your body can detox itself naturally - the more your other organs such as your liver are overworked. In my case, this reached a point where I could tolerate no alcohol whatsoever because i was de facto drunk even though i was consuming no alcohol.

Why am I telling you all this? Well, because in my view KC is ultimately a symptom of a more fundamental problem - the body's inability to fully metabolise what it is given.

Why? In order to understand, you need to understand the way the cornea functions as a living organism.
(You may like to refer to a medical textbook such as Basic Sciences in Ophthalmology. Just a word, i don't understand to the fullest extent how it works otherwise I would surely have found the answer to all of your problems. But from reading and knowing about my own condition, I understand the following. )

Collagen is crucial to the fibral constitution of the cornea: collagen constitutes apparently 70% of the dry weight of the human cornea, type 2 collagen being the predominant type in the human corneal stroma. Incidentally, the tensile strength of corneal collagen is provided by so-called hydroxylsineorleucine cross-linkages - I don't even pretend however to know what this is.
Proteoglycans constitute a further 10% of the dry weight of the cornea. The most common glycosaminoglycans are made up of keratan sulphate and dermatan sulphate glycosaminoglycans which tend to bind to different binding sites on the collagen fibrils- this is thought to play a part in regulating the spacing of collagen fibrils. Apparently, it has been suggested that the ratio between these 2 different types of glycosaminoglycan increases in corneal scars.

Now, in order to subsist and remain healthy, the corneal layers - endothelium, epithelium and stroma, need food like anything else in the body - and this is supplied in the form of minerals, glucose, and hydration. Indeed the cornea is 75-80% water and needs at all costs to be kept hydrated. In order to maintain normal hydration, an intact epithelium and metabolically active endothelium are essential.
However, how this happens is unclear. Nonetheless, one element is thought to be the collective action of sodium and bicarbonate ion pumps leading to the passive movement of water. Also, a sodium- potassium ATPase pump in the corneal epithelium ensures that potassium concentrations are kept high and sodium concentrations relatively low. Glucose needs of the epithelium are supplied by tear film and limbal blood vessels.

Now, this is all interesting but there is a point to this. The health of the cornea is dependent on your general metabolic health and more importantly on key mineral intake. If your body is not processing the food you take in, or worse you are giving it rubbish in the first place, then chances are that some things are going to be hit and the cornea is one of the first probably to suffer.

What struck me as interesting in this connection is the current study Riboflavin/ Ultraviolet A - induced Collagen Cross-linking by guys in Dresden, Zurich - apparently, other studies are being pursued in the US, Mexico and Italy.

If there is a local benefit to be derived from using Riboflavin directly on the cornea, my thinking is that there might be a more generic problem to be tackled in the way of riboflavin deficiency to start since it is allegedly important for the metabolism of fats, carbs and proteins.

On this point, has anybody with KC explored the issue of riboflavin or else endocrine disorders with a physician other than an ophthalmologist?

As my closing message indicates, alot of people try to deal with KC on a surgical basis, but as my thinking here demonstrates, I believe the whole issue could be dealt with far more expediently and less costly by way of nutrition or rectifying an endocrine disorder by way of medical supplement.

Thanks for your time.

Fabulous contribution IMO Michaell. This is an avenue I am going down. In fact in August I was informed by a healer/alternative medicine practioner in Wales that my eye condition KC was due to a "potassium" deficiency which ties in with your article.

I believe the whole issue could be dealt with far more expediently and less costly by way of nutrition or rectifying an endocrine disorder by way of medical supplement

I have just started contributing to this website forum as I have reached a crisis point in my KC. Its an incredible coincidence that you have contributed this as it follows my last contribution made earlier today.

The problem is what we are eating/drinking. We no longer digest wholesome natural food, and have become reliant on the fast food supermarket stuff in order to survive in the world of long working hours. The westernised diet is acid but a healthy diet should be alkali hence the high toxicity you refer to.

Philip Day's books give you an excellent insight into healthy eating and how our food has been contaminated by corporate business eg aspartame. Even our water supplies are being contaminated re; fluoridisation, and the dental profession put amalgam fillings in our mouths containing one of the most toxic substance known to man, mercury!

Keep us informed of your findings and how your getting on with your KC. But i do believe that we should be drinking loads of uncontaminated natural water and endeavour to stick to an alkali diet.

Great to connect up with a like minded KC sufferer!

Thanks - incidentally funny you raising this "alternative" issue - I have been making alot of use of people on the so-called alternative side. I actually sometimes laugh at this whole "conventional/ alternative medicine" talk. To me, from my experience, there is nothing alternative about it all! In fact, the alternative side of medicine is as essential a part as the conventional part. But somehow doctors fear something from the "alternative" profession. Perhaps because they get to the bottom of issues, whereas the conventional sector is only interested in either pushing drug prescriptions or else recommending surgery. In my opinion, you could save 50% of the NHS budget by promoting alternative to its fullest. Who would lose out, I wonder?

Anyway, interesting you mention amalgam fillings. This is one issue I explored in some detail last year. I had exponential mercury readings on my mineral analysis last year. Thoughts were that I could originally have inhaled the stuff whilst a child from my mother who had her mouth stuffed full of the fillings when I was a child. She developed the filling complications just a few years after I was diagnosed with the KC - the whole family was hit by the salmonella at the time.
Quite often the mercury itself is not the problem: the problem arises when the gut is too acidic; and this arises especially when you consume too many sweet, fermented or fungal rich foods. Also, pathogens have a nack of acidifying your gut. And once there the fiendish stuff goes to work over time slowly bringing your immune system down and closing sections of your body down.
As any chemist knows, heavy metals decompose badly in an acidic environment. This happens in the same way in your gut as in the third world with toxic matter decomposing the environment. So on the whole, in order to keep a robust immune system, you should just give foods which break down acidicly a wide berth.

Steven Williams wrote:The westernised diet is acid but a healthy diet should be alkali hence the high toxicity you refer to.

Sajeev in his posts has pointed out that the incidence of KC in the Asian community is 4 times higher than the white community. Presumably there would be a less westernised diet among British Asians than the wider population but would be interesting to compare any differences between them and those in their countries of origin.

Michaell

Thats some post with some interesting research youve done by yourself! Good on you!!

I do agree with you and Steven; as far as western diets have changed alot and we do now rely on man made chemicals and enhanced foods; and the payload of such a life style could be seen in the increase, for example, Cancers. We are now at the highest numbers of cancer diagnosis; and we are also told that life expectancy of cancer patients is also on the up?....What a surprise...But anyway; I mentioned something on his board some 2 years back I think about the effects of free radicals on the cell mitochondira...in its general terms and how this was fundamentally changing by virtue of our diets....and the only thing we could do to controll it was to analyse extremely powerful anti oxidants such as

Grape Seed Extract
Green Tea
Pomegranite Extract
Selenium at +100ug . day etc

The above kinda deviates from KC per se, and is more generalistic in how to keep the body and the cell and cell membranes at there optimum.....and Oh surprise surprise...if you look at studies on the above anti oxidants.....you will be shocked as to there power within the human body!!

J

My youngest brother and I both have KC, we both had measles very badly when we were children.

As far as I am aware no one else in the family suffers or has suffered from KC.

Lesley.

No allergies. No major illnesses. No pre diagnosis contact lenses. Mum had very mild KC but there's no other history of it in my family and I am an 'eye rubber'. So why do I get hit with KC so badly? Who knows. shrug

I fully respect everyone's choices in how they manage their KC but out of curiosity michaell why are you so determined to find a non surgical cure? I'm going away for the weekend so if you reply I won't be able to until Monday.