Plastic Implant Restores Vision Of N.Z. Girl

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29401, 31 December 1960, Page 4

Plastic Implant Restores Vision Of N.Z. Girl

(From the London Correspondent of “The Press")

LONDON, December 24.

There is every sign of success after an operation to insert a plastic lens into the right eye of 13-year-old Vivienne Brown, a New Zealand girl in hospital at Southend-on-Sea, Essex. Vivienne lost the use of her eye after a car ■ crash five years ago. Three days after the operation performed earlier this week the vision of her right eye had already improved. Whereas before the operation she could only see the blurred shape of her hand in front of her, she can now count her fingers. The full extent of the success of the operation will not be known for several weeks.

Vivienne, who came to Britain with her father, Mr F. V. J. Brown, a dairy farmer at Manawaru, near Te Aroha, is the patient of Mr Peter Choyce, a brilliant eye surgeon who is consultant to Southend General Hospital. He has successfully developed a method of replacing the

natural lens of an eye when it has been removed as a result of cataract or damaged by injury or disease. After a preliminary operation just after she arrived in Britain three weeks ago, and this week's final operation, Vivienne’s eye now contains a perspex implant, a roughly boat-shaped fragment 12 millimetres long with an optical portion in the centre, curved to fit just behind the eye’s cornea (without touching it) and in front of the iris—an all-acrylic anterior chamber implant. Vivienne will not feel the implant in her eye, she will not develop a squint as she probably would have done with one eye unable to focus, nor will -she suffer the inconveniences of a one-eyed person over judging distances and having a severely reduced range of vision on one side. She will wear glasses for reading. Five years ago, the Browns, driving home from a school picnic, crashed into the side of a truck. Mr Brown lost his right eye.

Vivienne suffered a cataract and was taken to Auckland to have the damaged lens removed. Help for Trip Her mother read in a magazine of Mr Choyce’s work as long as two years ago and wrote to him. He learned from a surgeon in Auckland that Vivienne was a suitable patient for an, implant operation. When he visited Sydney last October to speak to the Ophthalmological Society of Australia, the Browns took Vivienne there for him to examine. On the spot they decided that she should go to Southend. Facing this considerable question involving family, farm and no small expense, Mr Brown sailed for London with Vivienne at a few days’ notice. That was before he knew of the assistance he had been given. The Browns’ friends and neighbours collected £lOO, the Crippled Children Society gave £5O; and the New Zealand Blind Institute contributed £3OO to the cost of journey and fees. “We have to thank those people for making this trip over here possible,” said Mr Brown, immensely grateful for this timely aid. He heard about it just before Vivienne’s second operation. (In Britain, National Health assistance covers the whole cost of the operation for residents.)

No patient has come so far to Mr Choyce, though there have been cases from South Africa and Southern Rhodesia. At his suggestion, New Zealand House made arrangements for the Browns to stay at Southend and a senior officer met them at Tilbury Docks to take them* to the hotel. Next morning, Vivienne had the preliminary operation. Between the operations she and her father spent a day in London: they saw Buckingham Palace, watched the Horse Guards riding along the Mall, visited Westminster Abbey and rode on a bus to view the Christmas illuminations in the West End.

Vivienne will be out of hospital soon aft,er Christmas and will sail for home on February 15.

FOUR DAYS after her eye operation, Vivienne Brown helps to decorate the Christmas tree in her ward at Southend General Hospital. BELOW: The eye implants used by Mr Peter Choyce compared with a match. Each implant has a lens in the centre.