Annual check up today

[Alison Fisher]

I went for my annual check up today and everything was fine. Since joining here and reading other people's experiences I don't take the continuing good health of my grafts for granted as I once did.

I saw a lovely, chatty doctor. I have six stitches left in one graft, along with a loose fragment of another. He said they were blue indicating that they were made of something beginning with the letter m which I tried to remember but have now totally forgotten. Apparently if they had been made of nylon they would have broken down long ago.

He also told me that my right graft is a lot smaller than my left, which if I remember rightly he said reduces rejection problems but smaller ones tend to not give such good end results visions wise. I must be very lucky then as, with glasses, I have virtually the same sight in both eyes.

I had the usual close encounter with the 'blue glowy thing'. He told me the pressure was fine in both eyes - 11 and 14, which doesn't mean anything to me, can anyone explain the figures?

For an uneventful, routine visit it was very informative and interesting. Why couldn't I have seen a doctor that talkative when I was full of questions pre graft?

[Barney]

You obviously impressed him as someone who might understand long words and numbers Alison. They don't usually bother with me.

All that bric-a-brac is left over from grafts done over 10 years ago?

[Anne B]

Alison, Glad to hear all went well for you today.
I think you of met the only chatty doctor in England, congratulations

Anne

[Alison Fisher]

Yes Barney, all that bric-a-brac (great description ) is from my younger graft, and won't be touched unless it causes me problems which after all this time isn't very likely.

When I'm nervous I tend to start spouting the longest words imaginable, which is maybe why he fired a whole load back at me. Pity I can't remember many of them.

Anne - d'you reckon we could clone him so we can all have such a satisfying examination?

We had a conversation about continuous v individual stitches as well. I've had both and don't really have a preference. He said they sometimes do both on the same graft which surprised me. Has anyone else heard that?

[Barney]

Do you see a doctor at each check-up Alison? I generally just see an optometrist unless I ask to see a doctor. On the occasion before last I saw a young doctor (I think he was about 14 or so) who told me I didn't need any further checkups and would write me off. I asked if that was normal post-graft and he went off to ask. Came back and said I could see an optometrist in 12 months if I really wanted to. Was a tad surprised as I still have major issues with KC in my ungrafted cornea.

I had 16 individual stitches. Four were removed to adjust the graft and I persuaded them to remove the rest at about 10 months so that I could wear a lens. If they use a running stitch is it as easy to remove part of the stitch to adjust the graft?

[Alison Fisher]

Yep, a doctor everytime. I always have done. I currently go there around this time of year and see a high street optician in the spring.

Once when I was well pre-graft a hospital doctor told me to stop wearing lenses, go back to glasses and not to go back as there was little they could do for me. Sometime later when things were really getting on top of me I had to go back through my GP to get in at the hospital again.

Then three or four years ago I got really down in the dumps when a doc told me that they'd want to see me once a year for the rest of my life - so I had to laugh at myself today when 'Dr Talkative' offered to discharge me and I said (after reading all I have here) that I would prefer to be checked out once a year.

My continous stitch was taken out in one go at around (I think) eighteen months post graft. Just think 'ouch'. So with them you don't have the option of stitch removal to tweak your graft.

[Barney]

Seems hospitals each manage their provision in different ways. I guess the optometrists I see would call in a doctor if anything looked amiss. Seems odd if one doctor acting under the same consultant thinks an annual check is required and another doesn't want to see you ever again. Maybe it was your chatty bloke that wanted to get shot of me.

[Val G]

Where did you have your grafts done Alison?

[Alison Fisher]

By Mr Sandford-Smith at Leicester Royal Infirmary.

There never has been any consistency between doctors, and of course you never seem to see the same one twice.

I only ever had one pair of lenses through the hospital. The eight month wait (without lenses) for lenses that didn't fit was not exactly a high point in my life. I don't know how things are handled there now.

[John Smith]

Yes Alison, if you have a continuous stitch, it all has to come out in one go. I agree with you on the "ouch" front!

I have seen photos of grafts with both types of suture. Apparently, it's a best of both worlds thing: the continuous stitch is there to keep an even tension over the corneal surface, and the individual stitches are there to make it easier to tweak.

Having both is certainly unusual though!