William asks…
My mother had cataract surgery on both eyes and there have been problems?
She is a healthy 75 year old with no history of medical problems, she goes in for surgery and the first eye winds up getting a scratch that had to be treated and now the second eye is painful and after watching it for a few days the Dr. says she has eye shingles, is this something that occurs a lot, she has had the shingles vaccine and the Dr. said that it works better on the body than the eye, this all sounds a little weird and this procedure was something she was dreading and now she is dealing with the aftermath, just wondering how common these issues are and what did others do to deal with it. thanks
admin answers:
Sorry to hear about your mother. Cataract surgery is generally well tolerated and adverse reactions occur in less than 1.5% of procedures. Shingles is the reactivation of the varicella virus which causes chicken pox. After we get chicken pox, the virus lives in nerve cells. The virus can become active again in a specific distribution causing a rash and pain known as shingles. This can occur in any location on the body, including the eye and surrounding skin. When shingles affects the eyes it is known as Herpes zoster ophthalmicus and this is one of the most serious types of shingles, because it could potentially lead to blindness without treatment. It is unrelated to the surgery. The shingles vaccine reduces the chance of getting shingles, but it does not completely eliminate it. Unfortunately it did not in your mother’s case. The shingles vaccine reduces the chance of shingles developing anywhere. I have never heard that the zoster vaccine is less effective in preventing shingles involving the eye and I am familiar with most of the studies about this. Perhaps her doctor knows something I don’t. Anyways, no this is not a normal post-operative course and sorry that your mother has gone through all of this.
