Mega Doctor News –
By Roberto Hugo Gonzalez
Imagine your life without sight, without being able to admire the beauty of nature around you, and not being able to perform the simplest tasks.
Mega Doctor News spoke to a very unique physician, Dr. Roberto A. Argüello, M.D., F.A.C.S., P.A. He is a Diplomate of The American Board of Ophthalmology with a specialty in General Ophthalmology and a subspecialty in Corneal and External Diseases.
In a way, I can say that Dr. Argüello is a godsend to South Texas; he is the only one in this area that can perform a cornea transplant, which in many is the only procedure to give back a person’s sight.
Dr. Argüello told Mega Doctor News that the sense of sight is our most important sense; giving humans 80 % of the information about our outside world at the same time it completes the other senses; touch, taste, hearing, and smell.
According to statistics, due to the generous donors who give their organs for transplanting and medical research, some 46,000 people have cornea transplants each year. This is a sight-saving surgery, but it also requires patients and ophthalmologists to work closely together to insure the success of the surgery.
In order to understand the transplant process, Dr. Argüello explains what a cornea is. “Your cornea is a clear tissue that covers the front of each eye.”
He pointed out that it is about the size of a dime and the thickness of a credit card. The cornea is kept moist and nourished by a thin layer of tears. It is kept smooth by the blinking of the eyelids. If the cornea becomes distorted in shape, scarred, or hazy (opaque) from disease or injury, the light rays passing through it are distorted and the vision is reduced. In some cases, a corneal transplant may be necessary to replace the diseased or injured cornea with a healthy, clear cornea to restore good vision.
Dr. Argüello uses the latest technology available in order to transplant a cornea called DSEK. He emphasized that you may need a cornea transplant if your cornea no longer lets light enter your eye properly because of scarring or disease. In addition, during a cornea transplant, an eye surgeon removes a portion of your cornea and replaces it with a new section of cornea from a donor. The procedure is also called a corneal transplant or a keratoplasty.
“There are some patients in which only part of the entire cornea is diseased, only the inner most layer so the surgeon just replaces that.” He said that in order to get to that layer a small incision is made and the diseased tissue is removed. The same tissue of your donor cornea is then harvested and pushed in. “That is one of the most evolving techniques in my field,” he said.
Dr. Argüello graduated from medical school in 1976 from Asuncion Medical School in Paraguay. Ophthalmology is his specialty that takes care of diseases and surgery of the eye and his subspecialty is Corneal Disease and Surgery. He is a seasoned and experienced doctor with 31 years in this field.
He did his Internship at St. Francis General Hospital in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania from July 1978 thru June 1979. He did his Residency in Ophthalmology at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, Florida from July 1979 thru June 1982.
Dr. Argüello is proud to talk about his two Fellowships the first, in the Corneal And External Diseases Subspecialty at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina in July thru October 1982, and the second, at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute from November 1982 thru June 1983.
He was board certified by The American Board Of Ophthalmology in May 08,1983.
What values did your parents instill in you while you were growing up? “I was born in Asuncion Paraguay and my parents are Marcos and Ester Argüello. They taught me the value of honesty and integrity; my father disciplined me without being tough. On the other hand, my mother gave me a lot of advice on how to be around people, to respect the elderly and be nice to people.”
He thanks his parents for being his mentors in his life, “My parents, my base, and my foundation.” He feels that the most important thing for him is happiness, “whichever way you can get it.”
Mega Doctor News published this article on February 2014, and to continue reading the rest of the story follow the link that will take you directly to the complete to the article: https://j.mp/drrobertoarguello MDN
