Modification of axial length and astigmatism by scleral buckling surgery

Abstract

Scleral buckling surgery for retinal detachment alters the shape of the globe resulting in changes of the refractive state of the eye. In a prospective study of 52 eyes with retinal detachment we examined changes of corneal astigmatism and axial length induced by encircling buckling or segmental buckling spanning two quadrants. We compared our results with those found in literature. 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 postoperatively in all patients. There was no statistically significant difference between patients with encircling and segmental buckles fixed parallelly to the limbus, neither in the change of axial length nor in the change of astigmatism. 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 not always find a change of astigmatism. We suppose that the authors of the publications which differ from our results did not consider the change of the corneal axis by using the vector method.