[Ulcerative herpetic keratitis. Clinical and pathological findings and prognosis of the graft]

Between 1971 and 1982 33 corneae were excised for therapeutic keratoplasty because of ulcerative herpetic keratitis. The histologic findings and the clinical course enabled distinction of a nonreactive form with a rather good prognosis for keratoplasty (62% clear grafts) and an inflammatory form with bad prognosis (20% clear grafts) because of many herpetic recurrences. Perforating keratoplasty and first interventions in particular did better than lamellar keratoplasty or retransplantation. Existence of preoperative corneal vascularization compromised the prognosis of the graft. Preoperative perforation of the ulcer occurred rather often in nonvascularized corneae without compromising the prognosis of the graft.