October 5, 2009 
Every year between 70 and 90 patients need cornea transplatantion, and in the whole country 350 people are waiting for transplants. Equipment necessary for the new project was paid 1.3 million kuna…
For three to four months, in the Clinic for Eye Diseases in Split a corneal transplantations will start, dr. Kajo Bućan, the project manager, told us.
All necessary equipment is purchased. The value of new equipment is about 1.3 million, and it was bought with decentralized means of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. We received five new devices, of which three devices appear for the first time in the Clinical Hospital in Split.
We are currently in the process of purchasing microsurgery instruments worth about 200 thousand kuna, with which the cornea tissue of the donor is taken and transplanted to the recipient, said dr. Bućan.
Dr. Kajo Bućan: Patients from Dalmatia would no longer have to go to Zagreb for the corneal transplantation
Final education
Clinical Hospital in Split will be the first hospital in Dalmatia (from Zadar to Dubrovnik), which will perform corneal transplantation; every year between 70 and 90 people have the need for this surgery. All those who so far have been going to Zagreb for the operation, for few months will no longer have to do that.
Of course, in order to carry out the transplantation, donor is essential. When we explant the cornea from the donor, we send it to the Eye bank in the Clinical Hospital Rebro in Zagreb where quality, sterility, and all necessary parameters in relation to the cornea are being tested. Complete team that will work on corneal transplantation in Split has passed an education and is ready to expect the first operation.
By the end of this year, dr. Aleksej Medić, dr. Robert Stanić and me will go to Zagreb for a final education, says dr. Bućan. In the early 2008 in Croatia, about 350 people waited for the corneal transplant. The operation takes an hour to an hour and a half, and the immediate recovery takes from three to four weeks, but there is also a possibility of transplant rejection.
For all upcoming operations we have provided operating rooms and excellent microscopes for microsurgical operations on the eye. We also have all the equipment for pre-surgery diagnosis and postoperative follow-up of the transplant and condition of the eye, concluded dr. Kajo Bućan.
Cataract surgery with small incision
For the first time in Split recently has been performed the first cataract operation facoemulsification (ultrasonic cataract surgery) with incision of 1.8 millimeters. We’ve been doing ultrasonic cataract operation for almost 11 years in Split, but this is the first time that we had the operation performed with incision in the eye of 1.8 millimeters (i.e microincision).
Until now, the cut was 3.2 mm. This operation takes 10 to 12 minutes. With this latest achievement, we stand side by side with all the world’s centers that operate this type of surgery, claims dr. Kajo Bućan.
Taken from: www.slobodnadalmacija.hr, Author: Ivica Marković