Ethics in Eye Banking: Understanding Professional Attitudes Toward Industry Changes.

Purpose: To describe the ethical attitudes of corneal surgeons and eye bank leadership toward for-profit entities in corneal donation, processing, and distribution.

Methods: Fifty postfellowship corneal surgeons practicing in the United States and 25 eye bank leaders (eg, eye bank directors, CEOs, or presidents) for the Eye Bank Association of America-accredited eye banks completed a 22-question interview, focusing on corneal donation industry changes, including the entry of for-profit institutions.

Results: Most participants in both study groups agreed that they have concerns with the entry of for-profit businesses into eye banking (62% corneal surgeons, 68% eye bank leadership), although physicians partnered with a for-profit corneal processor were significantly more likely to have no concerns with the entry of for-profits into eye banking than corneal surgeons partnered with a nonprofit processor (P = 0.