Impact of lens thickness on complications of hypermature cataract surgery: A prospective study

To assess the correlation between lens thickness (LT) measured by ultrasonography and duration of surgery as well as complications.

The study was conducted in a hospital in the Parisian suburb of Bobigny, France.

A prospective and monocentric study was conducted. All patients undergoing surgery for hypermature cataract between January 2013 and March 2014 were included.

Morphological features, including LT, axial length, anterior chamber depth and vitreous length were assessed using A-scan ultrasonography. The other parameters assessed were the duration of surgery, occurrence of complications during surgery, visual acuity (VA) and corneal edema score one week after surgery.

Thirty eyes of 29 patients were included. Mean LT was 4.11±0.64mm (median: 3.89mm). Mean surgery duration was 24.2±8.7min. Three patients experienced complications during surgery: 2 capsular breaks and 1 posterior lens dislocation. At one week, the mean decimal VA was 0.49±0.34 and the mean corneal edema score was 0.76±1.09. The Pearson correlation coefficient was r=0.27 (P>0.05) between LT and surgery duration while it was r=-0.53 (P=0.01) between VA and LT. No correlation was found for the other parameters studied.

In this study, the linear correlation between LT and the surgery duration was low. The visual recovery at day 7 appeared inversely correlated with the LT.

LT did not seem to be a marker for longer surgery duration but appeared related to the visual recovery at one week.