Guttate corneal symptoms and treatment

Dr. Rodriguez is a specialist at the Oftalvist Ophthalmology Clinic. In this article he discusses the cornea gutatta, a layer that lies in front of the iris and can cause various symptoms in the patient if it becomes endemic.

The cornea is the transparent layer of the eye in front of the iris.

There is a layer of cells, on its inner side, which are in charge of maintaining the transparency of this natural lens and allow us to have a clear vision. This amount of cells can diminish due to different causes -in addition to a natural loss throughout life-, such as congenital corneal diseases, inflammations or infections, use of contact lenses, degenerative processes or complicated surgeries.

Gutatta corneal symptoms

When there is a significant loss or malfunction of the cells mentioned above, the cornea becomes edematous and waterlogged. This occurs because its function, which is to constantly extract water from the cornea so that it has an exact concentration that allows precise transparency, is lost and a whitening of the cornea occurs, progressively diminishing vision. In order to understand the vision of a patient with a decompensated guttate cornea, we could say that it would be similar to that of seeing through a fogged glass, being able to perceive only lumps.

Early diagnosis is essential when treating the problem.

This usually occurs in routine ophthalmologic check-ups, through examination with a biomicroscope that “cuts” the cornea with fine beams of light. A more effective and objective way to make a diagnosis is by means of an endothelial microscope, which allows us to measure the population of cells per square millimeter and to be able to make an accurate follow-up over time.

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Treatment of corneal guttate

In the most advanced cases of guttate cornea, we must resort to a transplantation of the endothelium by a donor, through a very sophisticated surgery called endothelial transplantation. It is important to remember that in the presence of a cataract, it must be operated as early as possible and with very protective techniques such as laser cataract surgery, which is very delicate and qualified.