A hospital in West Sussex in the UK is pioneering the use of stem cells to restore the eyesight of patients. The experiment, which is being carried out at the Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead, has already helped 40 patients see again
A hospital in West Sussex in the UK is pioneering the use of stem cells to restore the eyesight of patients. The experiment, which is being carried out at the Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead, has already helped 40 patients to see again.
The surgery at this hospital has been developed over the past five years.
Stem cells from the patient himself or from a donor are used to regenerate the cornea, the transparent front of the eye through which the light travels.
Ophthalmological surgeon Sherez Daya says: "Many people who have injured their eye or even those who were born with a lack of stem cells suffer from problems in the upper layer of the cornea.
Even if a cornea is implanted, it does not remain clear, and it may become cloudy and fall off. Therefore what is needed is to replace the missing stem cells."
Among the 40 patients who were able to see Deborah Catlin again. She was blind in one eye from the age of seven and became partially sighted in the other eye as well after being attacked with acid in a night club.
The hospital treatment allowed her to see her daughter well for the first time.
In the "Times" newspaper published in London yesterday, it was announced that the new surgical method involves removing stem cells from the eye and turning them, under laboratory conditions, into cell surfaces. These are implanted in the affected eye and are held by a membrane (the amniotic membrane) that dissolves and disappears during the fusion of the surface to the eye.
Sharaz Daya, an eye surgeon who led the British team of experts during the five years of development of the technique, said that doctors were amazed to see how he stimulated cells to regenerate the damaged eye surface. Tests conducted on the patients a year after the surgeries revealed no traces of the DNA of the stem cell donors. This means that the restoration was done by the cells of the eye itself - a permanent healing process that does not require the use of drugs.
According to Daya, "The technique not only works, even the donor tissues disappeared. This is what really amazed us. It looks as if the cells were removed from the eye and replaced with the patient's cells." The team hopes to identify the process of action, in the hope that it can be applied to the treatment of other damaged organs in the human body.
The details of the experiment were revealed this month at an international gathering of eye disease experts held in the US. The corneas of all the patients who participated in the experiment were damaged because they had no limbal stem cells left, which are usually found under the eyelid and help protect the cornea and maintain its clarity.
Edward Bailey, who lost his sight from acid in his eye, said the operation changed his life. "It was the most exciting moment," recounts Bailey, 65, "I couldn't believe it. For ten years I lived between black and gray shadows. After the operation, a nurse passed me and I saw a flash of blue uniforms. At home I took the blindfold off my eye, and I saw."
Nadai Hakim, a surgeon and consultant at St. Mary's Hospital in London, said that it is likely that the method will also be applied in other organ surgeries, reducing the need for organ transplants. According to him, "The hope is that stem cells will one day be used to regenerate many cells and tissues, and may even restore whole organs that have been damaged due to illness or injury. It's really a dream."
