Hydrops and driving

[Louise Pembroke]

Dweezil, I used to live in Brighton years ago. The contacts lens dept at the Sussex Eye Hospital was very good if that's where you are being referred. Perhaps the material of the lens or the solutions you use need looking at as well as the fit, anyone of those could be causing you discomfort. It's a good idea to get checked out at the hospital anyhow.
If you go to the main home page here there is a good article and pictures of Hydrops written by Ken Pullum, so check that out.
Not everyone with KC gets a Hydrops. For those who do, it's basically where the back layer of the cornea splits under the pressure of the increasing curvature of the KC and fluid seeps into the front layers causing a little bulge which is seen and felt by the individual. It might hardly be noticeable to look at with the naked eye, or it might be quite pronounced. Sometimes practitioners don't offer treatment and just let it drain off by itself and it heals relatively quickly. With a more severe kind there can be treatment and it takes a lot longer to heal.
Some people experience pain with it, others don't.
But as I said, not everyone gets this so it's not a forgone conclusion that just because you have KC that you will experience it.
Let us know how you get on, take care.

[dweezil1968]

i have been there, it was appalling, the KC test machines were under blankets in a dusty corridor! I also went to east grinstead and they would only prescribe the lens they could afford through their Trust funds, then i went to worthing hospital and now pay for the lens privately via the excellent Roger Dunbar in worthing, overall my experience of NHS KC care is that is sucks!

[Louise Pembroke]

Oh gee I'm really sorry, it is a long time since I was there, sorry to learn this.
Were you told that they couldn't prescribe the lens for you on the NHS?
Out of interest what kind of lens do you have and howmuch does it cost you?
Have you considered a referral to Moorfields?

[jayuk]

Dweezil

I wouldnt think you are alone! That is what I do and have done for about 5 odd years

I get my lenses private and previously also kept my appointments at Moorfields......

I agree 100% with you....Patient Care is not the focus in NHS; figures and waiting list numbers are!..

[Lynn White]

Pat

Just an optom slant on the legal aspects here.

We optoms do not have any powers to say yay or nay - its the DVLA that does. The most I can do really is tell the GP that someone is not legal - and even that is a bit suspect if I do that without telling you, the patient.

John is quite right, you can drive with one eye as long as that is legal which is roughly 6/12. However, as Jay says, there is a difference between should and can.

As you all know... you can get massive flare or blur round lights from a hydrops - or any other complication of KC and if you are not used to it, it can be very dangerous. You immediately lose your depth perception - assuming you had two eyes working together in the first place - which then means you can't judge distances at all well. This is why Gareth felt so weird even though he had raced cars! Judgements he made without thinking about spaces between cars and distances from the car in front had to be relearnt.

Once you learn your way round this and to cope with any flare etc around lights and compensated for the increased blind spot areas - then you can get mobile again. All of this varies between individuals.

So Pat... I hope this has been of some help... I know its all a bit vague - but like abything else, the DVLA rules were formulated with more cut and dry situations in mind... either you can see or you can't, rather than the borderline cases that KC presents!

Lynn

[Louise Pembroke]

Lynne, I've never understood the trouble with gauging distance thing. Even in the very early days of my KC, at school I would ask girls to not throw the netball at me because I was terrified as I couldn't judge when it was near me. If someone threw any ball at me I couldn't catch it, I had little hand-eye coordination, yet I had the coordination to dance!

[rosemary johnson]

Pat, sorry to hear about the hydrops. Hope it clears up soon and well. I've had 4 so far, and all at terribly bad times.

Louise - yes, I'm sure one can do a driving test in a tank. However, you'd get a driving licence that *only* licensed you to drive tanks.

As for judging distances - the idea is that, because your 2 eyes are not uquite in the same place, they send to the brain very slightly different pictures of what you're looking at. And the brain unscrambles these signals to give a "30dimensional" picture and enables you to tell how far away things are.
I've been wearing my lenses one at a time for years, and have next to no distance-judging ability. Well, I can tell how far round a paddock I am, for example, by counting the fence posts, but getting myself right into the middle is another matter!
I wouldn't dream of trying to drive - even if I could pass oth the acuity and peripheral vision tests - I just wouldn't feel safe to do so.

Of course, this judgement is biased by the fact I used to cycle a lot (in east and central London), and have been out on the roads riding a horse (in a line with others, I might add). So I know how dangerous cars are for the more vulnerable road users.

Rosemary

[Louise Pembroke]

Hey Rosemary thanks for explaining the problem with judging distances, makes sense. I didn't realise a Hydrops could happen more than once, would I be correct in thinking that it doesn't occur in grafted corneas?
I wouldn't feel safe to drive either, but you can see the advantage of a tank, just drive over or through everything!

[jayuk]

Louise

Hydrops can happen a number of times in the cornea...but each time it happens there will be excess tissue at the base of the cornea (scarring) where the healing took place.

And No, it generally does not occur in grafted eyes

J

[Louise Pembroke]

Thanks J, I count myself lucky then that I just had one in each eye before grafts. The scarring I knew about cos when I had the big one my vision was worse afterwards.