Reduction of postoperative against-the-rule astigmatism by lateral incision technique.

A group of 80 preoperative against-the-rule (AR) eyes had cataract removal and intraocular lens implantation with lateral (temporal) incision and suturing. Fifty-six of the 80 eyes had extracapsular cataract extraction (ECCE) and 24 had phacoemulsification (KPE) with capsulorhexis. For both procedures, subgroups (21 of ECCE, ten of KPE) with high preoperative AR astigmatism (> or = -2.0 D) were evaluated. Analysis of the postoperative data provided the following: (1) induced postoperative cylinder decrease, (2) effect of cutting and not cutting sutures, (3) induced axial shift, (4) postoperative astigmatic change as a function of time, and (5) comparative effectiveness of ECCE and KPE lateral incision procedures in reducing postoperative AR astigmatism.