Knowledge transfer from Svjetlost Eye Clinic to KBC Rijeka: first corneal transplantation performed

Rijeka, July 21, 2017 – The first historic corneal transplantation was performed at KBC Rijeka, made possible through the transfer of knowledge from Svjetlost Eye Clinic for Ophthalmology in Zagreb to the Rijeka Clinical Hospital Center. The procedure was performed by Prof. Iva Dekaris, MD, PhD, Medical Director of Svjetlost, in cooperation with a team of ophthalmologists from Rijeka led by Associate Professor Maja Merlak, MD, PhD. This achievement is the result of many years of cooperation between Svjetlost, which also serves as the Department of Ophthalmology of the University of Rijeka Faculty of Medicine, and KBC Rijeka in the fields of education and the exchange of clinical experience.

The operation was highly successful, it was announced at a press conference at the Rijeka hospital. Before the procedure, the patient’s vision was less than 5%. Just one day after surgery, her vision had improved tenfold to more than 50%, with further improvement expected over the following months. Corneal transplantation — involving the transparent front part of the eye — is the most common and most successful tissue transplantation procedure in medicine and is performed in cases of corneal injury or disease. One of the most common conditions is keratoconus, in which the collagen fibers of the cornea weaken and break down, causing the cornea to become cone-shaped and resulting in reduced visual acuity. This was also the case with this patient, it was explained. Keratoconus most commonly affects young, working-age people. The operation was performed using donor corneal tissue supplied by KBC Rebro in Zagreb from the national eye bank.

The first Lions Croatian Eye Bank was established in 1995 at Sveti Duh Hospital in Zagreb through the efforts of Prof. Nikica Gabrić, MD, PhD and Prof. Iva Dekaris. Since then, Croatia has followed the modern approach that is now the only accepted standard: corneal transplantation using donor tissue whose quality has been assessed and tested by an eye bank. Until now, approximately 150 corneal transplants have been performed annually in Croatia, exclusively in Zagreb, at Svjetlost and public clinical hospitals. Svjetlost in Zagreb is an internationally recognized corneal transplantation center, with 40% of its patients coming from abroad. Its specialists are the only ones in Croatia, and among the few worldwide, to perform the most advanced forms of lamellar transplantation, including DSAEK and UT-DSAEK. At Svjetlost, an individualized approach is used for every patient when selecting the most appropriate donor tissue, resulting in a 95% success rate among low-risk patients and as high as 70% among high-risk patients.

According to the World Health Organization, approximately 20 million people are blind due to corneal diseases that could potentially be treated through transplantation of damaged or diseased corneal tissue with donated tissue.

Prof. Nikica Gabrić, Director of Svjetlost, and Prof. Iva Dekaris, Medical Director of Svjetlost, are Croatian pioneers in corneal transplantation using eye tissue whose quality has been assessed by an eye bank. Together, they have performed more than 1,000 corneal transplantations each. They are also authors of the first Croatian book on eye banking and co-authors of two European textbooks on eye banking and corneal transplantation.

The purpose of an eye bank is to assess every donor cornea under a microscope before transplantation to determine the necessary medical quality parameters and to thoroughly test the donor’s health status in order to rule out the possibility of transmitting any infection to the recipient. The quality of Croatia’s eye banking system and the expertise of its specialists have also received international recognition. Prof. Iva Dekaris served as President of the European Eye Bank Association from 2010 to 2013 and was subsequently re-elected to the position by European experts for the 2019–2022 term.

Prof. Iva Dekaris recently began performing corneal stem cell transplantation at Svjetlost. This procedure can restore vision in patients who have suffered explosive or thermal corneal injuries, as well as damage caused by exposure to acids or alkalis. Apart from Svjetlost, such procedures are performed at only three other centers in Europe.