Health
1News

New Zealand's eye bank struggling to fill eye tissue orders post Covid-19 lockdown

Donations stopped during the lockdown, meaning some people in line to have their vision restored will have to wait even longer.

The New Zealand National Eye Bank is struggling more than ever to fill eye tissue orders after the Covid-19 lockdown.

Unlike other organ transplants, the sight-restoring operation was postponed in most cases during the lockdown along with other non-urgent surgeries.

That prompted the Eye Bank to stop collecting donations for several weeks, but now with surgeries running again in clinics and hospitals there’s a backlog for supply of eye tissue for corneal transplants.

“We have the people that were already booked for transplants during this period anyway and then the people who've been postponed during this period have had to be rebooked as well, on top of the bookings we already had, plus there's always new patients being referred for transplant as well so it’s really increased the demand over this period of time,” said Eye Bank manager Louise Moffatt.

The Eye Bank’s importing more corneas that normal from Australia where possible, but the supply issue post-lockdown is worldwide.

Bowen Eye Clinic’s Dr Reece Hall said what is normally a four month wait for the procedure for his patients in his private clinic due to availability of tissue, has been pushed back by several months because of the shortage caused by Covid-19.

“We've found we haven't had enough tissue, so people are being delayed in the operations we had originally booked.

“I've got one patient who unfortunately has been cancelled twice… we're still waiting for another date for him,” Dr Hall said.

In the surgery, the damaged cornea is removed from the eye and replaced with donated corneal tissue and sewn into place.

Last year around 300 corneal transplants were carried out but if there was enough tissue supply Ms Moffatt said there’s a need for 500 transplants to be done every year.

Patients waiting for the surgery in the public system have different wait times depending on their district health board.

At Middlemore Hospital in Auckland, 28 patients are on the wait list for corneal surgery, and four had their operation postponed by Covid-19.

The average wait time for the procedure at Canterbury District Health Board for 22 patients is 126 days, with two operations postponed because of the pandemic.

Organ Donation New Zealand said in a statement there were approximately 25 per cent fewer deaths in intensive care units during alert level four and alert level three than during the same period last year.

"This was accompanied by a reduction in actual organ donors, however there were no circumstances during Level 4 and 3 where donation was prevented due to Covid-19, or to the lockdown," the statement said.

"Changes in road trauma during Levels 3 and 4 will not have a significant effect on the number of donors during 2020."

Where as organ donations including heart, lungs and pancreas can only be made when a person is on a ventilator in ICU, eye tissue can be donated up to 24 hours after a person's death.

Ms Moffatt said New Zealand’s lack of awareness of corneal transplants and low donation rates are exacerbating the current shortage.

The Ministry of Health reports almost half of all deaths in New Zealand would meet the criteria for donating eye tissue.

The Eye Bank receives donations from an average of three people a week, but some week’s there are none and Ms Moffatt said they’re tracking down this year.

She said five donors a week are needed to meet New Zealand’s growing demand for cornea transplants.

“How donation needs to happen is that systems need to be set up in hospitals where people can be approached with this opportunity to donate because we know that a lot of people do want to do this but are not really getting that opportunity as much as it should be to provide the levels of corneas that we do need in the country,” she said.

"It is stressful when people pass away and family members sometimes change their decision which then other people miss out on," said Dr Hall.

New Zealand has a higher rate of keratoconus than other countries.

A 2019 study carried out in Wellington found the condition which distorts corneas may affect up to one in 191 high school students, and one in 45 Māori students.

Seventeen-year-old Mason Waterworth received a cornea transplant a couple of years ago after keratoconus caused him to lose vision in one eye over several years.

"Going from basically no vision in the eye to almost perfect vision helped immensely," he told 1 NEWS.

Mr Waterworth is a keen runner but before the surgery he struggled to stay on tracks, tripping over tree roots with no peripheral vision.

"It's pretty cool being able to know that people are out there who are giving up their eyes and stuff like that for other people."

Associate Health Minister Peeni Henare said a national agency aimed at increasing organ donation rates in New Zealand was set to open in July within the New Zealand Blood Service, but due to the Covid-19 health sector response the opening's been delayed by six to nine months.

SHARE ME

More Stories