Publisher's Synopsis
Diseases of the eye are one of the most important economic and social problems around the world. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), corneal opacity is a global cause of vision loss, accounting for 5.1% of all blindness - an estimated 1.9 million people. It is estimated that about 23 million people worldwide suffer from unilateral corneal damage. Common pathologies leading to vision loss include: keratoconus, trachoma, onchocerciasis, neonatal conjunctivitis, and keratomalacia as a result of vitamin A deficiency. The main intervention to restore the structure of the corneaand improve vision in these patients is end-to-end keratoplasty. This procedure is a replacement of the pathologic cornea by a donor cornea.The first successful penetrating keratoplasty was performed by Edward Conrad Zirm in 1905. He performed the transplantation of a donor graft into a human being. This solved one of the major problems of ophthalmology at the time - helping patients with bilateral corneal leukemia. "It was a ray of light that cut through the gloom of despondency" - the outstanding Soviet ophthalmosurgeon V.P. Filatov later noted.
