Effect of myopic laser in situ keratomileusis on epithelial and stromal thickness: a confocal microscopy study☆
Section snippets
Subjects
Twenty-seven eyes of 14 patients were enrolled prospectively in a nonrandomized fashion from August 1998 through January 1999. All participants were patients of the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota. Exclusion criteria included wearing contact lenses within 2 weeks (soft lenses) or 3 weeks (rigid lenses) of the study, diabetes mellitus or other significant chronic disorders, glaucoma or ocular hypertension (≥22 mmHg), use of any ocular medications, and use of any systemic medications known to
Results
No epithelial defects or flap abnormalities occurred during or after the LASIK procedure. All corneas healed without clinical evidence of haze, interface abnormalities, or inflammation.
Discussion
We have used confocal microscopy in vivo to study changes in the thickness of the central cornea and its layers after myopic LASIK. Our longitudinal study showed that epithelial thickness increased 22% by 1 month after LASIK compared with before LASIK, presumably because of epithelial hyperplasia. Thereafter, epithelial thickness did not change, but remained thicker than before LASIK. Our confocal microscopy study confirms previous high-frequency ultrasound studies,6, 7, 8 which also showed
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Supported by the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland (grant no.: EY02037); Research to Prevent Blindness, Inc., New York, New York; and the Mayo Foundation, Rochester, Minnesota.