Robert is a school administrator in Clover, South Carolina and he has keratoconus. This condition led to him needing to have a corneal transplant in 1979 & 1980. Prior to corneal transplants, Robert could wear contact lenses to treat his keratoconus. Once he had the corneal transplants, his eyes could no longer tolerate the contact lenses. His eyes would become irritated or red is he wore his contact lenses.
Robert was like most people who undergo corneal transplants and he was left with a lot of irregular astigmatism. Since he could not wear contact lenses after his corneal transplants, he wore glasses which did not correct his irregular astigmatism. Glasses can only correct normal or regular astigmatism. Glasses are not able to correct irregular astigmatism. This meant that Robert had about 20/80 vision with his glasses on during the day. His night vision was even worse even though he wore his glasses. He had to make his wife drive at night due to his poor vision from his irregular astigmatism. He used to sit in the front of meetings so he could see. He often had trouble distinguishing faces across the cafeteria at work even with his glasses on due to his irregular astigmatism.
Robert’s older brother, Sam, heard about the work Dr. Barbara Marcussen was doing at Complete Eye Care with scleral contact lenses to treat people with keratoconus, and corneal transplants as well as other corneal diseases and disorders. Robert went in for a consultation and learned how scleral contact lenses give you the comfort of a soft contact lens but the vision of a rigid contact lens. Dr. Barbara Marcussen is a certified WAVE designer and can design a custom made contact lens for each individual person’s corneal condition. Robert was able to get a scleral contact lens that vaulted over his transplanted cornea. This specially designed contact lens lands on the sclera or white part of the eye after vaulting over the cornea. This prevented any irritation of the eye such as Robert had in the past.
Robert can now wear contact lenses again without irritation. Robert has incredible vision since he began wearing scleral contact lenses, fit and designed by Dr. Barbara Marcussen. He no longer has any glare issues and driving at night is a breeze! Robert knows that each time he inserts his scleral lenses, his vision will be crisp and clear all day. Robert let us know that his vision is improved with his lenses and he feels he is “seeing, truly seeing” for the first time in a long time. The quality of his sight has been elevated since beginning to wear scleral lenses. Robert never thought he could see this well!
Robert is so glad he made the drive from Clover, South Carolina to Belmont. He says he has been seeing poorly for over 36 years and, until Dr. Barbara Marcussen fit him in scleral contact lenses, he missed out on so much due to poor vision from his corneal transplants secondary to keratoconus. After 36 years of having his wife drive at night, he is able to drive at night himself. He is able to sit in the back of the rooms at meetings and still see the presenter. Robert says he can see individual leaves when he looks out of his window instead of just green blobs on trees. His vision with his scleral contact lens is 20/25 with clean, crisp, sharp vision instead of the distorted haze he saw with his glasses on.
Robert says being fit in his specially designed scleral contact lenses to treat his keratoconus after his corneal transplants is the best thing he has done!
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