{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,10,16]],"date-time":"2026-10-16T02:47:48Z","timestamp":1792118868069,"version":"4.4.0"},"reference-count":20,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,18]],"date-time":"2025-09-18T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1758153600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"DFG SFB 1607\/1 2024","award":["501530074"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["501530074"]}]},{"name":"DFG SFB 1607\/1 2024","award":["CAP40"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["CAP40"]}]},{"name":"Center of Molecular Medicine Cologne (CMMC)","award":["501530074"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["501530074"]}]},{"name":"Center of Molecular Medicine Cologne (CMMC)","award":["CAP40"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["CAP40"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Medical Sciences"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Purpose: The aim of this paper is to study the visual outcomes, changes in higher order aberration (HOA) and corneal densitometry after debridement and excimer laser phototherapeutic keratectomy (PTK) for the treatment of Salzmann nodular degeneration (SND). Methods: This monocentric study includes 69 eyes from 54 patients who underwent debridement and PTK for SND (mean follow-up time of 447.1 \u00b1 597.7 days post-operatively). The following parameters were measured before and after PTK: best corrected visual acuity (BCVA) in logMAR, sphere, cylinder, calculated spherical equivalent (SPHQ), mean and maximum refractive power, astigmatism, HOA, corneal density and thickness. Patients were divided into two cohorts depending on additional visual acuity limitations (VAL). Results: Mean visual acuity improvement was 0.16 \u00b1 0.21 logMAR (p &lt; 0.001), independent of additional VAL, and was associated with normalization of the cornea (hyperopic reduction by 2.13 \u00b1 2.60 dpt, p &lt; 0.001), reductions in cylinder (1.49 \u00b1 2.44 dpt, p &lt; 0.001) and corneal astigmatism (3.01 \u00b1 3.39 dpt, p &lt; 0.001). HOA was reduced by 0.77 \u00b1 1.11 \u00b5m (p &lt; 0.001) and corneal density by 6.08 \u00b1 16.45 gray scale units (GSUs) in the center (p = 0.019) and by 9.32 \u00b1 12.08 GSUs in the mid-periphery (p &lt; 0.001). Haze occurred in 26.1% of patients (15.9% mild; 10.1% moderate). Re-PTK was necessary in 5.8%. Conclusions: PTK is a low-complication method for visual improvement in patients with SND, regardless of additional VAL, and is associated with a normalization of corneal parameters. HOA, corneal density and Kmax were reduced significantly and showed a correlation with visual acuity, implying that these objective parameters may have a good predictive value for visual acuity.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/medsci13030197","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,18]],"date-time":"2025-09-18T09:32:32Z","timestamp":1758187952000},"page":"197","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":3,"title":["Visual, Topographic and Aberrometric Outcomes After Phototherapeutic Keratectomy (PTK) for Salzmann Nodular Degeneration"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0009-9675-0167","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Simon","family":"Helm","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, 50931 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0000-0496-4921","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Johanna","family":"Wiedemann","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, 50931 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Niklas","family":"Reinking","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Reinking Augenklinik am Campus, 33100 Paderborn, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Benjamin","family":"Rosswinkel","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Medical Statistics and Computational Biology, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, 50923 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Bj\u00f6rn","family":"Bachmann","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, 50931 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1958-411X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Claus","family":"Cursiefen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, 50931 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Simona","family":"Schlereth","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Ophthalmology, Center for Molecular Medicine Cologne, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Cologne, University of Cologne, 50923 Cologne, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,9,18]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"7343","DOI":"10.1364\/BOE.412209","article-title":"Eye motion correction algorithm for OCT-based corneal topography","volume":"11","author":"Pavlatos","year":"2020","journal-title":"Biomed. 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