Microbiological spectrum and probability of transmission of infection from ocular tissues of enucleated eyes harvested from septicemic donors

doi:10.5500/wjt.v16.i2.118357

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World Journal of Transplantation

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2220-3230

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Baishideng Publishing Group Inc, 7041 Koll Center Parkway, Suite 160, Pleasanton, CA 94566, USA

Observational Study

Copyright: ©Author(s) 2026. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license. No commercial re-use. See permissions. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc.

World J Transplant. Jun 18, 2026; 16(2): 118357
Published online Jun 18, 2026. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v16.i2.118357

Microbiological spectrum and probability of transmission of infection from ocular tissues of enucleated eyes harvested from septicemic donors

Aditi Dubey, Priyanka, Deepak Soni, Deepti Chaurasia, Brindha Periasamy, Nikhila C Jain, Deepayan Sarkar, Mamta Singh, Srishti Khullar, Kavita Kumar, Pragyil Chaturvedi, Bhavana Sharma

Aditi Dubey, Kavita Kumar, Department of Ophthalmology, Gandhi Medical College Bhopal, Bhopal 462001, Madhya Pradesh, India

Priyanka, Deepak Soni, Brindha Periasamy, Nikhila C Jain, Deepayan Sarkar, Pragyil Chaturvedi, Bhavana Sharma, Department of Ophthalmology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences Bhopal, Bhopal 462020, Madhya Pradesh, India

Deepti Chaurasia, Department of Microbiology, Gandhi Medical College Bhopal, Bhopal 462001, Madhya Pradesh, India

Mamta Singh, Department of Ophthalmology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Rajkot 360110, Gujarāt, India

Srishti Khullar, Department of Ophthalmology, Military Hospital, Agra 282001, Uttar Pradesh, India

Co-first authors: Aditi Dubey and Priyanka.

Author contributions: Sharma B contributed to conceptualization, design, manuscript preparation and editing; Dubey A and Priyanka contributed equally to this manuscript as co-first authors; Dubey A and Kumar K contributed to data acquisition; Soni D, Priyanka, Sarkar D, Chaurasia D, Jain NC, Periasamy B, Singh M, Khullar S, and Chaturvedi P contributed to material preparation and analysis. All authors approved to submit the final version.

Institutional review board statement: The research adheres to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki and was approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee of both the study centers (approval No. IHEC-LOP/2018/IM0200).

Informed consent statement: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.

Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.

STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement-checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement-checklist of items.

Data sharing statement: Data will be made available upon reasonable request and approval from the corresponding author at drbavana_s@yahoo.co.in.

Corresponding author: Bhavana Sharma, Professor, Department of Ophthalmology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences Bhopal, Saket Nagar, Bhopal 462020, Madhya Pradesh, India. drbhavana_s@yahoo.co.in

Received: December 31, 2025
Revised: January 19, 2026
Accepted: March 20, 2026
Published online: June 18, 2026
Processing time: 150 Days and 3.5 Hours

Core Tip

Core Tip: Corneal transplantation remains an important sight restoring procedure, but has major demand-supply gap of donor corneas, worsened by exclusion of septicemic donors due to presumed infection risk. This bicentric cross-sectional study evaluated the microbiological spectrum of ocular tissues harvested from septicemic donors and their potential risk of infection transmission. Cultures from conjunctiva, cornea, sclera, aqueous, vitreous, and post-mortem blood were assessed and correlated. Microbial growth rates were comparable between groups, with organisms largely reflecting commensal flora. Only one corneal and scleral sample matched blood culture isolates. A strong association was found between longer death-to-retrieval time and contamination. Overall, septicemia did not significantly compromise tissue sterility, suggesting potential reconsideration of transplantation guidelines to reduce tissue wastage.