UK: A man receives the first 3D-printed prosthesis

The patient at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London will be the first man in the world to have an eye created using a 3D printer. Doctors believe that the prosthetic will look more realistic than a traditional acrylic eye.

“I’ve needed a prosthesis since I was 20 and have always felt insecure about it,” Steve Farris, now 40, told the BBC.

This innovation will not only allow for more realistic prosthetics, but will also cut patients’ adaptation time to prosthetics in half, from six to three weeks.

“When I leave the house, I usually look in the mirror and never like what I see,” Varzi said with regret. “These new eyes look great, and because they’re made with 3D printing technology, they’re going to get better and better.”

The traditional technique for making an artificial eye involves the patient undergoing a two-hour session during which an eye socket mold is made. After that, it takes three weeks to manufacture the prosthesis. At the end of the process, the fake eye is fitted and painted to resemble the real eye.

According to Moorfields Eye Hospital, the 3D technology should allow the prosthetics to be fabricated more quickly, in about two weeks, and the initial mold making time can be as little as half an hour.

“We hope the clinical trial will provide us with strong evidence of the value of this technology, and show how it can make a difference for patients,” Professor Mandeep Sajo, an ophthalmologist at Moorfields I Hospital told the BBC.

For the expert, the new technology “obviously has the potential to reduce queues”.

The use of 3D printers to try to build artificial limbs for parts of the human body is unprecedented. Just this year, scientists at Swansea University in Wales sought to 3D-print a replacement for human cartilage to give a ten-year-old girl an ear prosthetic.