[ 2015-01-27 ]

Baby born without EYES: Hospital staff stunned
The three-month-old had been fitted with expanders
to allow his sockets to grow, but he rubbed them
out

The parents of a baby who was born without eyes
are hopeful their son will one day be able to
see.

Staff at Arizona’s Banner Desert Medical Center
initially thought baby Richie’s face was swollen
at birth.

But they were stunned to discover the reason his
eyelids would not open was because he did not have
eyes – an extremely rare condition, called
Anophthalmia, they had never come across before.

Richie’s mother Kelly Lopez, who had a normal
pregnancy, became worried after almost two weeks
went by and her son had opened his eyes.

An MRI scan 13 days after he was born showed he
had been born without eyes.

She told KTLA: ‘By the time we left, I think
every single nurse had cried with us.’

But she and her husband, from Mesa, Arizona, are
optimistic that science will progress enough to
help Richie, who does have an optic nerve, in his
lifetime.

The three-month-old had surgery to be fitted with
expanders in his sockets, so that can grow enough
to hold a prosthetic eyeball in the future.

But after rubbing his eyes, they fell out – and
only one remains after his mother was able to
place it back in.

She described her husband’s encouragement as he
held their son while she struggled to insert the
expander, adding: ‘I got it in and then I just
cried’.

Mrs Lopez said: ‘I do hold out hope. I know that
researchers are testing it and doing what they
can, but I do hope that, one day, they’ll be
able to grow an eye or transplant an eye.’

But for now, the couple are helping their son with
special toys and development programs.

What is Anophthalmia
Anophthalmia is a medical term that means an
absence of the eye – and a child may be born
with one, or both eyes, missing from the eye
socket. The terms Anophthalmia and Microphthalmia
(small eyes) are often used interchangeably since
CT scans or MRI show some remnants of either the
globe or surrounding tissue in most cases.

The condition is extremely rare and a report from
a prospective study of 50,000 newborns found an
incidence of microphthalmia of 0.22 per 1,000 live
births.

In a recent study in England, the prevalence of
Anophthalmia and Microphthalmia was one per 10,000
births.

It is not known exactly what makes Anophthalmia
occur, but it is likely due to a disruption in the
sequence of developmental steps that take place
when the eye is forming during pregnancy.

They may result from inherited genetic mutations,
sporadic genetic mutations, chromosome
abnormalities, prenatal environmental insult or
other unknown factors.

Unfortunately, there is no treatment that will
restore vision in children affected by
Anophthalmia and they need to undergo repeated
hospital visits. Many have prosthetic eyes to
ensure that the bone and soft tissue around the
eye socket grows properly and to improve
appearance.

Source - Intl Children’s Anophthalmia

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