Treatment

Depending on the causes and condition of your retinal detachment, there are a number of different treatment options.

A retinal hole or tear

To seal the retina around the tear and prevent the retina peeling off, you may be asked to have:

• laser treatment – the retinal hole can be heat sealed (like spot welding) by directing a laser beam of light through the pupil of the eye. The scar produced seals the hole, or
• cryotherapy treatment – a freezing treatment applied by a pen-shaped probe to the outside of the eye. This freezes through to the retinal hole and, as with laser treatment, promotes scar tissue as a seal.

These procedures may be a little uncomfortable but not painful, and are usually performed under a local anaesthetic as an outpatient. However, they are only effective for retinal holes or tears.

A detached retina

This may require more complicated operations and procedures as well as the above treatments.

In some case, the jelly-like substance called the vitreous is not working and this is responsible for the retina becoming detached. As part of your surgery, we remove this jelly during an operation called a vitrectomy. During this operation we make tiny cuts in the eye and remove the vitreous. We then put a gas or silicone oil bubble in the eye. This acts as a splint to hold the retina in position to help it to heal. If we use a gas bubble, your normal body fluids will replace it naturally over time. If we use silicone oil, we may need to remove this during another small operation several months after your first operation.

In some cases, we may ask you to keep your head and body in a particular position – called posturing – to provide support to seal the holes in your retina. The bubble floats inside the eye cavity and we will usually ask you to hold your head in a position so that the bubble lies against the holes. Your doctor will explain to you if posturing is necessary and the duration that you will have to posture for.