A Comparative Study of 5.5mm Temporal Sclerocorneal Manual Small Incision Cataract Surgery Versus 5.5mm Temporal Clear Corneal Extended-incision Phacoemulsification with Implantation of a 5.25mm Rigid pmma Intraocular lens in the Bag

Objective: Aim of the study is to Compare the astigmatism induced by a reduced temporal sclerocorneal tunnel incision manual small incision cataract surgery with an extended temporal clear corneal Phacoemulsification of similar width . Methods: A Prospective, randomised controlled study was carried out in 224 selected patients who were again divided into two groups - Group A (112 patients) and Group B (112 patients). Group A patients underwent temporal manual small incision cataract surgery with a 5.5 mm sclerocorneal incision and Group B underwent phacoemulsification by a 2.8 mm clear corneal temporal incision which was extended to 5.5 mm before IOL implantation. In both groups, a 5.25 mm rigid PMMA IOL was implanted in the bag. UCVA and BCVA of both group of patients was quantified and analyzed at 1 week and at 6 weeks Observation: It was seen that the mean surgically Induced astigmatism in group A (N=112) was 0.5625D , which was slightly lesser than that in Group B (N=112) which was 0.65D, although the p-value of 0.26 indicated that there was statistically no significant difference in visual outcomes between the two groups of patients. Here, a p-value of < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Conclusion: In Skilled and Safe hands, refractive outcomes following performing a 5.5mm temporal sclerocorneal frown-incision manual small incision cataract surgery and a phacoemulsification procedure by a 2.8mm temporal clear corneal incision extended to 5.5mm for implanting a 5.25mm rigid PMMA IOL , are comparable.