Trends in keratoplasty from central and northern India. Part II: Types of keratoplasty

Purpose: To report the types of keratoplasty and analyze trends over a period of two decades in central and northern India.

Methods: This was a retrospective review of eye bank registries of six tertiary eye care centers located in central and north India from 2005 to 2021. The indications and various keratoplasty procedures were compared between 2005-2012 and 2013-2021 to analyze the trend.

Results: A total of 13,223 corneal grafts were performed, of which therapeutic penetrating keratoplasty (TPK) (5719, 43.3%) was the most common procedure, followed by optical penetrating keratoplasty (OPK) (5528, 41.8%), Descemet stripping endothelial keratoplasty (DSEK) (1279, 9.7%), deep anterior lamellar keratoplasty (DALK) (376, 2.8%), Descemet membrane endothelial keratoplasty (DMEK) (215, 1.6%), patch grafts (75, 0.6%), and keratoprostheses (31, 0.2%). Overall, OPK procedures decreased (-14.1%, P < 0.001), but TPK (+3.1%, P < 0.019), DSEK (+7.1%, P < 0.001), and DMEK (+1.9%, P < 0.001) procedures increased. Although there was an increasing trend in the use of DALK (+0.8%, P < 0.083) and keratoprostheses (+0.3%, P = 0.074) procedures, the trends were not statistically significant.

Conclusion: In keeping with worldwide trends, an increasing trend in lamellar keratoplasties was observed in central and northern India during the past decade. The trend was significant for DSEK. However, as corneal ulcers and scars were the major indications for keratoplasty, TPK and OPK remained the most common procedures.