Eye tissue transplant restores man’s sight

Doctors have for the first time restored a blind man’s sight in one eye by combining tissue from both eyes.

Emiliano Bosca, 83, had been totally blind for the past six years, having lost the sight in his left eye through damage to his retina 30 years ago.

Doctors have for the first time restored a blind man’s sight in one eye by combining tissue from both eyes.

Emiliano Bosca, 83, had been totally blind for the past six years, having lost the sight in his left eye through damage to his retina 30 years ago.

“When I woke from the anaesthetic and realised I could see the outline of my fingers and my two hands, I felt as though I was being born again,” Mr Bosca said.

A rare condition, ocular pseudopemphigoid, began to affect his right eye 10 years ago.

Mr Bosca had previously had two traditional corneal transplants but each failed because of a deterioration in the surface of his eye.

Surgeons at Molinette Hospital, Turin, transplanted a third of the left eye into the less damaged right eye, which began to work again. The left eye was rebuilt with donor material for aesthetic reasons.

Michele Reibaldi, head of the Molinette’s eye clinic, and Vincenzo Sarnicola, a cornea transplant specialist, who ­headed the surgical team, said: “We expect a lasting success for the right eye because it has been rebuilt with the patient’s own ­tissue and (is) therefore potentially safe from the rejection problems that affected the previous ­transplants.”

The operation involved transplanting the entire ocular surface of the left eye, including the cornea, the entire conjunctiva and part of the sclera.

The surgeons said the technique could be employed on other patients in a similar condition to Mr Bosca.

“I can read the time on the telephone, see the outline of objects, the colour of cars that pass us on the street,” Mr Bosca said after returning to his family.

The Times