Introduction: Injury to cornea due to trauma or infection leads to stromal scarring and varying degrees of unaided and/or best corrected visual acuity loss posing a major challenge for the corneal specialist. Therapeutic options for superficial scars are rigid contact lenses or allogenic lamellar corneal transplantations which may fail due to graft rejection.

Aims: The primary aim of our case report is to demonstrate use of ipsilateral autologous limbal transplantation (IALT) in a case of mid stromal corneal scar resulting in effective resolution of the same.

Case Report: A 35-year-old male with a dense corneal scar, lagophthalmos and neurotrophy, with a healthy limbus, underwent ipsilateral autologous limbal transplantation. The scar gradually resolved and the clarity is maintained for past 40 months.

Discussion: Corneal stromal stem cells (CSSC) have been shown to reside in the human limbus and in the corneal stroma and have shown capacity to reverse corneal scaring in genetically engineered mice. Based on robust laboratory work from Funderburgh and others, we successfully transplanted autologous limbal chips in a human without manipulation effectually restoring corneal clarity and demonstrating over 40 months of stable outcomes.

Conclusion: We attribute the restoration to proliferation of resident CSSC induced by a conducive milieu provided from the limbal CSSC, or due to the migration of the CSSC from the limbal chips themselves. Functional keratocytes thus generated restored physiological collagen lamellae rendering the once scarred cornea transparent. The case also demonstrates an effective translation of years of meticulous bench side work to the clinic with a potential to benefit millions with corneal blindness.

Keywords: Ipsilateral Autologous Limbal Transplantation (IALT); Corneal Stromal Stem Cells (CSSC)

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Citation

Citation: Charuta J Puranik., et al. “A Case Report on Ipsilateral Autologous Limbal Transplantation for Treatment of Corneal Stromal Scars”. Acta Scientific Ophthalmology 3.6 (2020): 18-23.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Charuta J Puranik., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.