Surgical treatment of primary and secondary cataract in severe myopia

Secondary cataract after extracapsular surgery is one of the main complications in aphakic eyes. In severely myopic eyes secondary cataract not only impairs visual acuity but also interferes with peripheral retinal exploration; in these eyes Nd-Yag laser capsulotomies are not recommended because of the high risk of retinal detachment and also because this technique does not solve problems related to peripheral retinal examination. For these reasons, in severely myopic eyes the authors perform extra capsular cataract extraction without IOL implantation and, if secondary cataract appears, they perform surgical cleaning of the capsule. The authors emphasise the good visualization of the peripheral retina obtained with this technique.