{"id":6785,"date":"2017-03-22T01:45:52","date_gmt":"2017-03-22T01:45:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/uncategorized\/rbwh-introduces-corneal-crosslinking-2.html\/"},"modified":"2017-07-07T05:09:25","modified_gmt":"2017-07-07T05:09:25","slug":"rbwh-introduces-corneal-crosslinking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/news\/rbwh-introduces-corneal-crosslinking","title":{"rendered":"RBWH introduces corneal crosslinking"},"content":{"rendered":"

RBWH introduces corneal crosslinking<\/h1><\/h1><\/div>

The future is looking much clearer for Jaimee Reynolds as a result of a treatment now being offered by Royal Brisbane and Women\u2019s Hospital Ophthalmology Department.<\/p>\n

\"Patient

Thumbs up from patient Jaimee and Dr David Gunn following the RBWH\u2019s first Corneal Collagen Crosslinking procedure<\/p><\/div>\n

Jaime, 29, was the first patient at RBWH to undergo Corneal Collagen Crosslinking for keratoconus \u2013 a degenerative condition of the cornea characterised by progressive bulging and thinning.<\/p>\n

Ophthalmology Registrar Dr David Gunn said Corneal Collagen Crosslinking was a one-off surgical procedure effective for stabilising patients who have early keratoconus and are showing signs of getting worse.<\/p>\n

\u201cEarly treatment for keratoconus is paramount because the disease can cause progressively blurred vision that eventually is unable to be corrected with glasses or contact lenses,\u201d Dr Gunn said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough it does not lead to complete loss of vision, if left untreated and advanced it can lead to severe visual loss, enough for patients to be classified as legally blind.<\/p>\n

\u201cCorneal Collagen Crosslinking can halt the eye disease in its progressive stage giving patients the chance of better vision long term.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore crosslinking, the alternative was for patients to undergo invasive corneal grafts, which could take up to\u00a0two years to receive and required\u00a0precious donor tissue.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Jaimee, deterioration in vision would greatly impact on her work as a security guard.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s great being able to have this procedure in a public hospital. A mate had it done at a private clinic, but that wasn\u2019t an affordable option for me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Jaimee made the five-hour journey from home for the day surgical procedure that took less than 30 minutes and was relatively painless.<\/p>\n

\u201cPatients may have some pain and discomfort for the first few days after the procedure as the surface of the eyes heals,\u201d Dr Gunn said. \u201cThey usually need between one week and one month off work, depending on what they do.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough vision may improve slightly after surgery, the aim of treatment is to stabilise a patient\u2019s vision so it doesn\u2019t get progressively worse.\u201d<\/p>\n

How it works<\/strong><\/p>\n

Corneal Crosslinking works by increasing the number of molecular crosslinks between collagen fibres to increase the strength of the cornea and slow the progression.<\/p>\n

Local anaesthetic eye drops are applied and the superficial cells from the surface of the eye are removed. This is followed by delivery riboflavin drops and ultraviolet light to cause chemical reactions that create covalent bonds between the collagen fibrils.<\/p>\n<\/div>

<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The future is looking much clearer for Jaimee Reynolds as a result of a treatment now being offered by Royal Brisbane and Women\u2019s Hospital Ophthalmology Department.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6789,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[350],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6785"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6790,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions\/6790"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/rbwh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}