CASE REPORT
Epinucleus Scraping: Safe New Phacoemulsification Technique for Rock-Hard Cataracts
Aki Kondo1, *, Mari Goto2, Tatsuya Mimura3, Shunichi Tanaka4, Masao Matsubara5
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2021Volume: 15
First Page: 21
Last Page: 24
Publisher ID: TOOPHTJ-15-21
DOI: 10.2174/1874364102115010021
Article History:
Received Date: 14/5/2020Revision Received Date: 8/12/2020
Acceptance Date: 25/12/2020
Electronic publication date: 12/03/2021
Collection year: 2021
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Introduction:
Phacoemulsification of rock-hard cataracts is challenging because the leathery epinucleus at the posterior plate often found in such cataracts tends to prevent smooth dissection of the nucleus. We devised an Epinucleus scraping technique to overcome this problem.
Methods:
The epinucleus is initially stripped of the hard endonucleus using a new instrument. The isolated endonucleus can then be readily chopped and divided with a phaco chopper or in the usual manner.
Conclusion:
Phacoemulsification of rock-hard cataracts can be carried out safely and easily with epinucleus scraping technique.