Comparison between Clear Corneal Incision and Scleral Tunnel Incision in Phacoemulsification on basis of post-surgical outcomes

To compare post-surgical astigmatism induced by phacoemulsification through 2.8mm clear corneal incision at steep axis versus superior scleral tunnel incision. This study was performed on 200 eyes of 198 patients of cataract reporting at Eye Department, SRMSIMS, Bareilly from July 2015 to December 2015. They were randomly assigned to two groups: Group A, 2.8mm clear corneal incision at steep axis group and Group B, the superior scleral tunnel incision group. Induced refractive change caused by corneal incision at steep axis showed an overall improvement in pre-operative astigmatism with minimum level of significance while post-surgical astigmatism induced by scleral tunnel incision was found out to be minimal with a good visual rehabilitation. Corneal incision at steep axis is an effective technique to reduce pre-operative astigmatism while scleral tunnel technique is suitable in cases where minimal change in pre-operative astigmatism is targeted.