Patient satisfaction of pterygium surgery using fibrin glue versus suture autograft

Purpose: To compare pterygium surgery with fibrin glue autografts and sutured autografts in terms of length of surgery time and postoperative patient satisfaction. Methods: All pterygium operations performed at Sibu Hospital (Sarawak, Malaysia) between October 1, 2012 and September 30, 2013 were included. Results: Eighty-one cases were included in the study. The fibrin glue group and suture group had 33 and 48 cases, respectively. The mean age of the patients was 50.56 (SD: 7.61). The fibrin glue group had a shorter mean duration of surgery (17.18 minutes, SD: 10.66) compared to the suture group (22.60 minutes, SD: 12.88) (P = 0.05). Patient satisfaction at first week review was 93.9% for the fibrin glue group and 75.0% for the suture group (P = 0.027, OR 5.2 [95%CI: 1.1, 24.9]). Patient satisfaction at sixth week review was 97.0% for the fibrin glue group and 77.1% for the suture group (P = 0.023, OR 9.5 [95%CI: 1.2, 77.8]). There was no serious adverse event in this study population. Conclusion: Fibrin glue has shorter mean duration of surgery and significantly higher patient satisfaction at first week and sixth week post-pterygium surgery compared to the suture technique.