section name header

Evidence summaries

The Incidence of Posterior Capsule Opacification after Cataract Surgery

Visually significant posterior capsule opacifications appear to develop in more than 25% of patients undergoing extracapsular cataract extraction and intraocular lens implantation over the first five years after surgery. Level of evidence: "B"

A systematic review 1 including 49 studies was abstracted in DARE. Incidence of posterior capsule opacification (PCO) after extracapsular cataract extraction with posterior chamber intraocular lens implantation was measured in a one-year analysis in 31 studies (12,335 participants), in a 3 year analysis for 19 studies (66,496 participants), and in a five year analysis for five studies (1,866 participants). The pooled incidence of PCO was 11.8% (95% CI 9.3 to 14.3%) at one year, 20.7% (95% CI 16.6% to 24.9%) at 3 years, and 28.4% (95% CI 18.4% to 38.4%) at 5 years. The overall relative risk of PCO was 0.69 (95% CI 0.51 to 0.94) for convex posterior surface versus plano posterior surface intraocular lenses.

    References

    • Schaumberg DA, Dana MR, Christen WG, Glynn RJ. A systematic overview of the incidence of posterior capsule opacification. Ophthalmology 1998 Jul;105(7):1213-21. [PubMed] [DARE]

Primary/Secondary Keywords