If your cornea is damaged due to an injury, disease, or infection, your doctor might recommend surgery. A corneal transplant might improve your vision when vision loss is caused by cornea damage. Here's how the procedure is done and what recovery is like.

A Corneal Transplant Is An Outpatient Surgery

Cornea surgery is often done in your eye doctor's clinic or an outpatient surgery center, so you don't have to stay in the hospital overnight. However, your overall general health condition is considered when deciding how to do your surgery. For instance, you may only need local anesthesia and sedation, but your eye doctor might also decide to use general anesthesia when it would be best for you. Even though you may not be put to sleep, you'll probably be drowsy and relaxed. Plus, the local anesthetic will prevent you from feeling pain. You don't have to be alert since your eyelids will be held open with an instrument.

When the surgery is over, you'll be allowed time to wake up and recover from the procedure before going home. You'll be sent home with a protective eye patch in place that you may need to wear a few days, and you won't be able to drive yourself on the same day as the operation.

There Are Different Techniques For Cornea Surgery

Since your cornea can be damaged in different ways and in different locations, different surgical techniques have been developed. Your eye doctor may cut out your cornea and replace it with a donor cornea, or you may have a partial replacement of only the front or back part of your cornea. These removed portions are then replaced with donor material.

A Full Recovery Can Take Months

The cornea of your eye doesn't have a rich blood supply like many other parts of your body, so healing from cornea surgery can take several months. You'll need to be protective of your eye after your surgery by wearing safety glasses or goggles when there is a risk of your eye being hit or of something flying into your eye. Right after surgery, you'll need to use eye drops and take medications as instructed by your eye doctor to keep potential infection under control.

Your vision might be a little blurry at first, and it may take weeks or months to know how much the surgery helped with your vision. A corneal transplant may not leave you with perfect vision, but it should improve the vision you have now once the damaged part of your cornea is removed.

Contact a company like ReVision LASIK and Cataract Surgery today in order to learn more.

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