He devised one of the early procedures to address retinal detachment, and he received the Gonin Medal from the International Council of Ophthalmology in 1950.
He returned to Barcelona, spending the rest of his life seeing patients there, with the exception of a move to South America during the Spanish Civil War.
[1] One of the first surgeons to promote intracapsular cataract extraction, Arruga also suggested technical improvements to several other eye surgeries.
In this surgery, a band was made around the sclera using Supramid, a synthetic suture material, but the technique caused some problems with scleral erosion.
[3] Arruga was close friends with Jules Gonin, the Swiss ophthalmologist who devised the first retinal detachment repair surgery.