Cate’s Trip to Pittsburgh- Part 2: We Meet the Doctor

We saw the esteemed Dr. the morning of our second full day here.  The Eye Clinic is a busy place and he was running behind but that worked out best for us.  Cate was napping and would not wake up for the technician to put in the dilation drops.  She would do the opposite thing needed and screw her eyes tightly shut.  The Dr. came in briefly.  He is originally from England with a hint of a British accent and a big, happy personality- very comfortable with his office team and my screaming infant.  We finally got the drops in and Cate also got her nap in while the drops worked on her eyes.  (Eye drops will become a recurring theme for us.) The Dr. finally examined her and, after doing an ultrasound of her eye, diagnosed her with PFV not Peters Anomaly!  He said this was “good news.”  He said it looked like PA initially but the “membranous bodies” (seen but not identified by the pedi opthomologist at home) in the posterior part of her eye were the key- blood vessels.  PFV or persistent fetal vasculature is a condition where developing blood vessels didn’t recede as usual & necessary.  The resulting increased pressure in the eye pushed all the anterior parts of her eye together   (cornea/iris/lens) and created her congenital corneal opacity.  The Dr. said this is very rare and that he’d only seen seven of these cases in his career, whereas he’s done over a thousand cornea transplants.  This changed his plan for her surgery.  Rather than simply remove the adhered/diseased cells of the cornea/iris, the Dr. said he would need to permanently remove her lens, cut the veins, hope everything moved back into place, and possibly enlarge her pupil.  He said he was “so happy” we brought Cate to him because her condition is so rare.