You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 107, Issue 10
  • Extending the utility of anterior corneal buttons through refrigeration and glycerol cryopreservation: utility rate and outcome analysis

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Clinical science
Extending the utility of anterior corneal buttons through refrigeration and glycerol cryopreservation: utility rate and outcome analysis
  1. Hsin-Yu Liu1,2,3,
  2. Hsiao Sang Chu1,2,3,
  3. Wei-Li Chen1,4,
  4. I-Jong Wang1,4,
  5. Fung-Rong Hu1,3,4
  1. 1 Department of Ophthalmology, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
  2. 2 Graduate Institute of Clinical Medicine, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan
  3. 3 National Eye Bank of Taiwan, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Taipei, Taiwan
  4. 4 Department of Ophthalmology, National Taiwan University College of Medicine, Taipei, Taiwan
  1. Correspondence to Professor Fung-Rong Hu, Department of Ophthalmology, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan; fungronghu{at}ntu.edu.tw

Abstract

Background/aims To evaluate the utility rate, indication, outcome, and cost of refrigeration and glycerol cryopreservation for storing anterior corneal buttons during endothelial keratoplasty for subsequent use in tectonic lamellar patch grafting.

Method Anterior corneal buttons collected after precutting or prestripping during endothelial keratoplasty from January 2014 to December 2019 were preserved using the following protocol: (1) refrigeration for up to 4 weeks at 4°C in Optisol-GS and (2) glycerol cryopreservation for up to 2 years. The utility rate, outcome and cost of these cryopreserved anterior corneal buttons were retrospectively examined.

Results During the 6-year study period, 26 anterior corneal buttons were refrigerated and 49 were cryopreserved for extended use. The utility rates for the refrigerated and cryopreserved anterior corneal buttons were 69.2% and 73.5%, respectively. Their average preservation periods were 0.53±0.05 and 12.76±0.94 months, respectively. Noninfection-related perforation was the leading indication for using the extendedly preserved anterior corneal buttons. The average postoperative follow-up periods were 10.03±2.91 and 14.35±2.17 months for refrigerated and cryopreserved anterior corneal buttons. Secondary keratoplasty was required by 7 of 18 (38.9%) and 6 of 36 (16.7%) patients receiving refrigerated and cryopreserved anterior corneal buttons, respectively. None of our patients developed graft infection from donor tissues.

Conclusion Cryopreservation can safely extend the utility of anterior corneal buttons. This method not only reduced the wastage of the limited donor tissue but also was cost-effective.

  • Eye (Tissue) Banking
  • Cornea
  • Treatment Surgery

Data availability statement

All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as online supplemental information.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bjo-2022-321433

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    Data availability statement

    All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as online supplemental information.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Contributors H-YL and F-RH initiated the project and collected the data for this analysis. H-YL drafted and revised the paper with F-RH. HSC, W-LC and I-JW provided their data and revised the paper. F-RH accepts full responsibility for the finished work had access to the data, and controlled the decision to publish.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.

    Linked Articles

    • Highlights from this issue
      At a glance
      Frank Larkin
      British Journal of Ophthalmology 2023; 107 i-ii Published Online First: 21 Sep 2023. doi: 10.1136/bjo-2023-324539