Descemet Stripping Endothelial Keratoplasty

Corneal edema secondary to endothelial dysfunction is the most frequent indication for full thickness penetrating keratoplasty. Although penetrating keratoplasty has a high success rate in terms of the percentage of clear corneas, visual rehabilitation is slow and is limited by high amounts of spherical and cylindrical refractive error. In the last 10 years, new procedures have been developed to selectively transplant the posterior cornea containing healthy corneal endothelium. These techniques have proven to have many practical and theoretical advantages compared with traditional full thickness penetrating keratoplasty. The most recent such procedure, which is termed ‘‘Descemet stripping endothelial keratoplasty’’ (DSEK) is comparatively straightforward and forgiving and thus is being rapidly adopted by corneal surgeons worldwide.