Potential role of cyclosporin A in corneal grafting.

The immunosuppressive drug cyclosporin A has been shown to be effective in preventing corneal allograft reactions in rabbits when administered by intramuscular injection. However, when used systemically in man, the drug may have potentially serious side effects and a series of experiments has therefore been performed in order to investigate the use of topically applied cyclosporin A in rabbit corneal transplants. Using a single set model of the corneal allograft reaction, two groups of rabbits treated with topically applied cyclosporin A for periods of four and thirteen weeks respectively showed significantly increased graft survival compared with untreated controls (P less than 0.001).