Keratoconus is found in people between the ages of 10 and 25 and is known to progress slowly over a period of 10 years.
What Is Keratoconus?
Keratoconus occurs when the cornea thins and gradually bulges outward into a cone shape, which causes blurred vision and sensitivity to light. Both eyes are usually affected.
This weakness in the eye is a factor associated with genetic predisposition, and often affects more that one member of the same family.
What Are The Symptoms?
- Blurred or distorted vision: Vision that is progressively poor and not easily corrected
- Increased sensitivity to light: Glare and halos around lights, difficulty seeing at night, and problems with night driving
- Frequent changes in eyeglass prescriptions: Astigmatism is often high and changes rapidly over time
- Sudden worsening or clouding of vision
- Double vision: Even when you cover one eye, you still see double vision
- Eye irritation or headaches: Associated with eye pain
Symptoms may vary depending on the stage the condition’s advancement.
How Is It Treated?
- Early stages: Glasses can treat nearsightedness and astigmatism.
- Intermediate stages: Corneal collagen cross-linking (CXL) is a non-invasive procedure that can strengthen the cornea and prevent vision loss. CXL involves applying a vitamin B solution to the eye and activating it with ultraviolet light. One doesn’t usually feel or notice it. Peripheral vision is most commonly the first to be affected.
- Advanced stages: A corneal transplant may be necessary to replace the damaged cornea with a healthy donor cornea.
Other treatments for keratoconus include:
Contact lenses
Soft contact lenses can correct blurry vision in early stages. As the cornea changes shape, patients may need to wear hard contact lenses, such as rigid gas permeable (RGP), hybrid, or scleral lenses.
Implantable ring segments
These can modify the curvature of the cornea to correct nearsightedness and astigmatism.
Intacs
These are clear, arc-shaped corneal inserts that can reshape the front surface of the eye.
