Refractive and Topographic Errors in Topography-guided Ablation Produced by Epithelial Compensation Predicted by 3D Artemis VHF Digital Ultrasound Stromal and Epithelial Thickness Mapping

Abstract

To describe and quantify the errors inherent to topography-guided ablation of irregular corneas due to natural epithelial thickness compensatory remodeling. Artemis very high-frequency (VHF) digital ultrasound scanning (ArcScan Inc) was performed on a cornea that had undergone radial keratotomy with inferior and superior trapezoidal keratotomies, resulting 27 years later in high irregular astigmatism (+6.50 -8.00 × 101) and severe loss of corrected distance visual acuity (CDVA) to 20/50. The epithelial thickness profile was highly irregular, masking a significant proportion of the true stromal irregularity from front corneal surface topography, which would have resulted in significant inaccuracies had a topography-guided ablation been performed. The stromal ablation pattern of a transepithelial phototherapeutic keratectomy (PTK) ablation was modeled, which appeared logically to reduce the areas of abnormal stromal surface elevation and resembled a hyperopic astigmatic ablation of approximately 3.50 diopters of cylinder. Artemis-assisted transepithelial PTK was performed to target the stromal irregularity masked by epithelium. Artemis-assisted transepithelial PTK induced a refractive change similar to that predicted (+2.24 -3.97 × 120), demonstrating the refractive shift produced by the epithelium. The epithelial thickness profile became relatively regular and CDVA returned to 20/20⁻². Two topography wavefront-guided ablations were performed to correct the remaining topographic irregularity and refractive error, resulting in a near plano refraction, significantly lower higher order aberrations, and CDVA of 20/20⁺². A knowledge of stromal surface shape and power shift produced by epithelial thickness profile alterations after corneal surgery has the potential of improving the efficacy and safety of custom corneal ablation.