New Lenses for Old

When British Surgeon Harold Ridley took the daring step of implanting a tiny plastic lens inside the eye of a patient operated on for a cataract (TIME, Feb.

4, 1952), it seemed that medical science had won a great victory in the 3,000-year battle to save elderly clouded eyes. For two years the results looked good. Then an unexpected drawback appeared: some of the plastic lenses slipped out of place, into the middle of the eyeball.

Now a German ophthalmologist, Er-langen's Professor Eugen Schreck, reports a danger-free adaptation of the Ridley technique. Instead of following nature closely, as did Ridley, in putting the plastic lens behind the iris, in the position of the removed natural lens, Surgeon Schreck puts his lens in front of the iris.

And instead of plastic, he uses a glass lens. Only 5 mm. in diameter, the circular lens has wings (Schreck calls them "bridges") that give it an overall width of 11 1/2 to 13 1/2 mm., according to the size of the eyeball. The wings fit into the angles where the iris is attached, and hold the lens steady so that it can never fall back into the eyeball.

At least, so Dr. Schreck hopes. He has been watching some patients with glass inserts in their eyes for almost two years.

Many have normal and the rest have useful distance vision. So far, none of the lenses has moved out of place.

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