One thing I haven’t really spoken about yet is Isla’s esotropia (cross eyed appearance) of her right eye. After each cryotherapy treatment her eye would get very swollen and turn in a little. This was generally fairly temporary after the cryotherapy. However, intra-arterial chemo has made it a lot worse. It certainly got dramatically worse after her first IAC in December last year and has since got worse and worse with each treatment. I believe it’s due to a combination of damage to the eye (and eye muscles etc) from treatment, but also as a result of having very little vision in that eye and the muscles simply having no reason to pull the eye to the centre. It’s still fairly intermittent, but is more often than not turned in at least a little. It’s certainly worse when she is tired and she does have some days when her eye almost looks normal, but more often than not it’s quite turned in. When it is centering reasonably well, it almost always ‘flickers’ – wanders off a bit and comes back, wanders and comes back. Her right eye is also generally a little more closed than her left, particularly out in bright sunlight. If she does manage to keep her eye, these things may be able to be corrected with surgery and muscle strengthening in the future.
While it’s difficult for the photos to accurately represent the change over time, these photos give you a bit of an idea. She certainly has some days/moments where her eye almost looks normal and people who don’t know her wouldn’t even notice that there was anything wrong, but some days her eye is very turned in and very droopy.
This appearance doesn't last forever and while Isla's eye still has good days and bad days, this is what she looks like now - March 2021.
© Alison Davey 2021
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