A randomized clinical trial to evaluate the usefulness of amniotic membrane transplantation in bacterial keratitis healing

Abstract Purpose To determine whether early amniotic membrane transplantation improves the outcomes among patients with bacterial keratitis. Patients and methods In this prospective randomized clinical trial 49 eyes from 49 patients with bacterial keratitis received routine antibiotic therapy followed by double-layer amniotic membrane transplantation during 2–5 days after start up of the medications and the second group of 50 eyes from 50 patients only received routine antibacterial therapy. The main outcomes including visual acuity, corneal healing time, scar size, hypopyon size and duration as well as the depth of corneal opacity and neovascularization were followed for a six months period. In addition, Langerhans cells density and tectonic procedures were documented during the healing period. Results Our results indicated statistically significant better best corrected visual acuity (p