Novel Keyhole Surgery restores Vision in a School going Child painfully blinded by Eye Trauma

One year ago a poor family from Bihar migrated to Ludhiana in search of employment. The father became a daily wage earner working in a farm and the mother, along with taking care of 3 children, started working as household help. The children, 6, 8 and 10 year old were put in a nearby school. One day the 8 year old son came home after being injured by the nib of a pen at school. The mother took him to the nearby Civil Hospital where he was operated upon and sent home. In a month’s time the child gradually lost vision and came to Sankara Eye Hospital, Ludhiana with a painful blind eye.

The child was admitted and after examination by Dr. Madhu Karna, Pediatric Ophthalmologist at Sankara Eye Hospital, Ludhiana, immediately started on medical treatment. The boy had developed a pouch full of fluid inside the eye due to injury which was raising the pressure inside the eye and obscuring the vision. This is a rare presentation of Iris Cyst as a complication of a fairly common eye injury with a pen/

After mulling over the various possibilities a novel approach of chemically shrinking the sac with a very fine needle in an ultra short stitchless procedure pencil in children. The ultrasound and OCT images were taken to judge the size and the origin of the fluid filled sac. Due to the drugs used to lower the pressure inside the eye, the child’s heart rate went down, making any prolonged procedure under general anesthesia unfeasible. was chosen. Soon after the surgery, not only did the eye pressure come down but the vision started improving. The child was given medication while observing for shrinkage of the sac postoperatively.

In 6 weeks time the child’s vision was restored to normal, the sac had shrunk and the pressure of the eye became normal. The child started going back to school, much to the relief of the parents working hard for a living. It was not only delightful to restore vision in a painful blind eye but also gratifying to observe the successful outcome of a child’s traumatized eye.