Abstract
Keratitis is a common eye disease where a biopsy is required to determine the underlying cause of the inflammation of the cornea. Currently, no standardized tool is available for this purpose and corneal scrapings are performed with a scalpel or wide needle, frequently with inconclusive results as too little material is removed for fear of penetration. Consequently, biopsies are rarely performed and a broad-spectrum antibiotic is prescribed, which may result in untoward sequelae. This study investigated the usefulness of a skin punch tool to obtain corneal biopsies as compared to a regular scalpel. The punch tool was more accurate to reach the objective biopsy radius of 2 mm. Additionally, biopsy duration was about half (88.4 s) when using the punch tool as compared to the use of the scalpel (162.4 s). This research shows a verification method that can be used to evaluate corneal biopsy tools.
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Acknowledgments
This paper is the result of a collaborative research between the Department of Ophthalmology (UZA), Centre for Cell Therapy and Regenerative Medicine (Ophthalmology/Vaxinfectio – UA/UZA) and the Department of Product Development (UA) together with the industrial partner D.O.R.C. Special thanks go to Benedicte Verbraeken, who initiated this research. Additionally, we want to acknowledge Alexis Jacoby, Ingrid Moons and Ni Dhubhgaill Sorcha for their input and feedback and all students contributing to this publication within the course of Applied Research Methods at Product Development, University of Antwerp.
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Veelaert, L. et al. (2018). Usefulness of Skin Punch Tools for Corneal Biopsy. In: Duffy, V., Lightner, N. (eds) Advances in Human Factors and Ergonomics in Healthcare and Medical Devices. AHFE 2017. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 590. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60483-1_63
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60483-1_63
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