"Eye Jewelry"
Implanted in the Netherlands
(April 2004)
Eye surgeons at the Netherlands Institute for Innovative Ocular Surgery
have implanted tiny pieces of jewelry called "JewelEye" under the
conjunctiva of the eyes of six women and one man in cosmetic surgery pioneered by
ophthalmologists in Rotterdam.
The procedure involves inserting a 3.5 mm (0.13 inch) wide piece of specially developed jewelry -- the range includes a glittering half-moon or heart -- into the eye's
conjunctiva under local anesthetic at a cost of 500 to 1,000 euros ($610 to
$1232). The implant is made of platinum.
The piece of jewelry is inserted in the conjunctiva -- the mucous membrane lining the inner surface of the eyelids and front of the eyeball -- in sterile conditions using an operating microscope in a procedure taking about 15 minutes.
Gerrit Melles, director of the Netherlands Institute for Innovative
Ocular Surgery said,
"Without doing any harm to the eye we can implant a jewel in the conjunctiva, So far we have not seen any side effects or complications and we don't expect any in the future."
The Rotterdam-based institute, which develops new ocular surgical techniques in corneal, cataract and retinal surgery, developed and patented the jewelry made with special materials and the surgical procedure.
The institute, which carries out the procedure in cooperation with an eye clinic near the city of Utrecht, said it has a waiting list for people who wanted the implant.
However, British eye experts disagree and fear cosmetic invasive
surgery could harm the eye. Eyecare Trust spokesman
John Dart, a consultant ophthalmic surgeon at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London, said this type of surgery could irritate the eye.
"The stud is quite likely to move around and migrate because the tissue in the conjunctiva is quite loose," he said.
"Any movement is likely to cause inflammation. If it moves, there will be some scar tissue and you could get some bleeding."
Richmond Eye.com Editor's Comments:
Other potential problems associated with this implant include:
-
There appears to be a lack of appropriate studies examining the safety
of this type of implant, and the material involved, in the human eye.
Typically such procedures would be performed
initially
in non-seeing eyes
to determine a track record of long term safety before performing the
procedure in seeing eyes.
-
While platinum is generally considered to be inert, any foreign body
within the conjunctiva may incite an inflammatory response which may
require medical treatment or removal of the implant.
-
Many metals are extremely toxic to the eye, both externally and
internally. Is there any regulatory agency monitoring the purity and
refinement of the platinum used in these implants, and that they are free
of other potentially toxic contaminants or other metals even in low
concentration? Even low concentrations of toxic metals and chemicals
could leach into the eye, leading to long-term visual loss.
-
It is questionable how refined the edges of the implant are, and what
quality control measures are used to determine how the implant is made and
how smooth it is. For example, intraocular lens implants undergo
stringent quality control requirements, and the edges of the implants
appear smooth even under scanning electron microscopy. Even the
slightest roughness of the edge of this metallic implant may lead to
extrusion through the conjunctiva, migration over the surface of the eye
under the conjunctiva, and even erosion into the eye. The constant
blinking of the eyelids over the implant and the movement of the eye under
the lids creates continuous forces onto the implant which would lead to
migration or erosion.
-
Even minimal trauma to the eye over the area of the implant, including
eye rubbing, could impale the implant into the eye, creating a surgical
emergency with a likely loss of vision.
-
The implant could migrate into the sub-tenon's capsule space, where it
could subsequently migrate into the orbit behind the eye, making it
virtually non-retrievable.
In general, undergoing implantation of a metallic object such as this
onto the eye should be done with extreme caution, with the knowledge of
the risk to the eye and of visual loss, and that the implant will likely need to
be removed in the future.
