Clinicopathological correlation in therapeutic keratoplasty

Infectious keratitis is a major cause of blindness worldwide.Though medical therapy is the first line of management ,some cases which are resistant to therapy and progress require therapeutic keratoplasty.Outcome of tkp depends on various factors one of which is identification of causative organism which guides in postoperative therapy and reduces the chance of recurrence. Corneal scrapings followed by staining and culture are standard diagnostic tools.cases where etiology is not clear, microbiological and histopathological analysis of host corneal button obtained during TKP reveals organisms missed by staining and culture.This study aims to evaluate how well the clinical findings match with microbiological and histopathological results in patients undergoing therapeutic keratoplasty. Understanding this correlation helps us in guiding proper treatment, reduce graft failure and improve visual outcome in severe infectious keratitis.