Changes in corneal astigmatism following pterygium surgery – comparison of 3 different surgical techniques

Aim
To evaluate changes in corneal astigmatism following pterygium surgery.

Material and methods
Data from 70 eyes after pterygium excision surgery was analysed. Three different surgical techniques were used: I – conjunctival autograft with sutures, II – amniotic membrane transplantation with fibrin glue, III – conjunctival autograft with fibrin glue. The preoperative and postoperative keratometric measurements, evaluated with corneal topography were analysed.

Results
Following surgery, astigmatism decreased from 1.180 ± 0.766 to 0.578 ± 0.437 in a cohort treated with conjunctival autograft with sutures, 2.647 ± 2.010 to 0.554 ± 0.478 in those after amniotic membrane transplantation with fibrin glue, 1.355 ± 2.476 to 0.853 ± 0.601 in patients who underwent conjunctival autograft with fibrin glue. There were no between-group differences in postoperative corneal astigmatism (p = .553).

Conclusions
Pterygium results in high corneal astigmatism, which decreases to an acceptable level following excision. According to our study, the type of grafting or the use of suture or glue to fixate the graft does not have a significant effect on changes in astigmatism.