Spontaneous fracture of an implanted posterior chamber intraocular lens.

PURPOSE: Spontaneous fracture of an intraocular lens (IOL) haptic is a rare complication of cataract surgery. The authors report a case of spontaneous fracture of an implanted posterior chamber IOL.

CASE: Five years ago, a 12-year-old patient underwent linear lens extraction, posterior capsulotomy, and anterior vitrectomy due to traumatic cataract and received a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) biconvex posterior chamber IOL implanted in ciliary sulcus. Five years later, IOL optic was found in anterior chamber with its haptics broken from the optic-haptic junction.

DISCUSSION: The broken haptic was examined with scanning electron microscopy. The fracture site of the haptic was on the optic-haptic junction. The fractured surface had a regular appearance.

CONCLUSIONS

To our knowledge, this is the fourth report of spontaneous fracture of an implanted posterior chamber IOL.