New surgery methods help patients with strabismus

New surgical techniques are helping more people with strabismus, including adults who develop double vision and can no longer drive, ORF reported on Sunday. Such operations are being performed at Kepler University Hospital in Linz.

Carina Körner, a 38-year-old self-employed consultant from Leonding in the Linz-Land district, suddenly began seeing double while driving. “I had just driven into a tunnel and accelerated. Then my left eye completely slipped out of alignment and I saw double,” she said.

After the incident, Körner could no longer drive or ride a bicycle. She also had trouble walking. Her ophthalmologist referred her to the hospital’s specialist orthoptics clinic, where orthoptist Ulrike Pichler measured her angle of deviation and found that her tendency to squint had become uncontrolled.

“Her brain could no longer compensate for this tendency to squint,” Pichler said.

During a 45-minute operation under general anaesthesia, surgeons adjusted the muscles of both eyes. The eyes are now aligned again, said Elke Schmidbauer, an ophthalmologist at Kepler University Hospital. “Her symptoms have also improved very well in everyday life,” she said.

Doctors distinguish between outward, inward and vertical deviations, among others. At least 30 different forms of strabismus are known, Schmidbauer said, and each requires a different treatment. Operations must therefore be planned individually, making it necessary to develop and try new surgical methods in some cases.