Seeing Clearly with an Iris Implant

Seeing Clearly with an Iris Implant Melissa Medley: It’s construction manager Don Davis’s job to focus on the details. But for the past 30 years, that’s been hard. He’s missing part of his right eye, damaged by a direct hit from a racquetball Don Davis: One of the things that happened during the trauma was that I lost my iris. The iris for whatever reason drew back and at the time, it was one large black pupil. Dr. Amit Chokshi: The iris is what makes a pupil smaller and larger. So it acts like the shutter for the eye. Melissa Medley: Everything Don saw had a glare, halo around it or he saw double, sunglasses and colored contact lenses weren’t enough. Don Davis: If you can imagine someone taking a flashlight and just turn it on and stick it around your eye, and you get a kind of sense of that. It was that -- all the time. Melissa Medley: Doctor suggested an artificial iris. Dr. Amit Chokshi: It’s about 9 millimeters in width and only four millimeters it actually allows light to get in. So less than 50% of the device let’s light in. Melissa Medley: This prosthetic iris is custom-colored match to the patient’s healthy eye. In surgery, it’s implanted doing 9 millimeter- incision between the white of the eye and the cornea. In Don’s case, a lens was added to improve his vision. Don Davis: The sun is much better as you can imagine. It’s not nearly blinding as it was. Melissa Medley: With iris implant, providing an extra layer of protection, Don seeing his world in a whole new light. I'm Melissa Medley reporting.