CHANGES OF CORNEAL ASTIGMATISM AND AXIAL LENGTH INDUCED BY SCLERAL BUCKLING SURGERY

Background Scleral buckling surgery for retinal detachment alters the shape of the globe resulting in changes of the refractive state of the eye. Materials and Methods In a prospective study of 52 eyes with ret inal detachment we examined changes of corneal astigmatism and axial l ength induced by encircling buckling or segmental buckling spanning tw o quadrants. We compared our results with those found in literature. R esults In most patients we found a shortening of the globe, rather in cases with encircling buckles than in the cases with segmental buckles (parallelly to the limbus). We also saw changes in astigmatism postop eratively in all patients. There was no statistically significant diff erence between patients with encircling and segmental buckles fixed pa rallelly to the limbus, neither in the change of axial length nor in t he change of astigmatism. Conclusions In all cases of scleral buckling procedures changes of corneal astigmatism and axial length are to be expected. So our results differ from those of other authors who did no t always find a change of astigmatism We suppose that the authors of t he publications which differ from our results did not consider the cha nge of the corneal axis by using the vector method.