All About Laser Eye Surgery

What Should I Expect Before, During, and After Surgery?

Before:

Always get a ophthalmologist’s consultation before getting the actual LASIK surgery. If you wear contact lenses, its best to stop wearing them a month before your consultation and switch to eyeglasses. Contact lenses can change the shape of your natural cornea depending on what kind of lenses you wear. Going to the initial exam without the natural shape of your cornea can lead to incorrect measurements which then lead to incorrect results that causes poor vision in the future.

You should tell your doctor about all your past eye procedures or problems you’ve had before and any medications that you’re taking to make sure the surgery will run smoothly. A day before the actual surgery, you shouldn’t apply anything on your face including lotions and/or makeup.

After the surgery, your eyes will be blurry so its important that you arrange a ride for you to get back home and also a ride for your follow-up visit to the doctor. The doctor might prescribe you some medications to help you relax but its blurs your vision so you should be extra careful.

During:

The actual procedure takes about 30-40 minutes. You will lay in a chair and the doctor will drop a numbing substance into each eye. The doctor will then use a instrument to hold your eyes open the entire time so the doctor can operate. You may feel some discomfort and pressure but it’s part of the procedure so don’t be terrified. The doctor will shine a laser (not the same laser that is going to correct the eyesight) light in your eye telling you to stare at it so he can clean up the tissue around. **Note: If you cannot stare at something for more than a minute then LASIK surgery isn’t right for you. After the doctor moves all the tissue to its proper position, he will then use the laser to burn the tissue. Its noted that many people said the burning smell is similar to burning hair so its normal if you smell that.

After:

After the doctor has completed the surgery, he will put a protective layer over your eyes to prevent any harm. Its important that you don’t go swimming or into any hot tubs for at least 2 months and make sure to wear your protective shield every night to sleep for at least 1 whole month. Its noted that post-surgery patients experience the urge to rub their eyes but please do not rub your eyes as it will move the flap on your eye. You will feel a lot of discomfort so you should take a few days off from work. If you experience serve pain in your eyes then you should contact your doctor right away and not wait until your follow-up appointment.

Precautions / Risks

Precautions:

There are many diseases out there in this world such as:

• Herpes simplex or Herpes zoster
• Glaucoma, glaucoma suspect, or ocular hypertension.
• Eye diseases, such as uveitis/iritis
• Eye injuries or previous eye surgeries.
• Keratoconus

and many more (please ask your ophthalmologist to see if you have any) that can interfere with the refractive procedure effectiveness and safety.

Risks:

• Blepharitis. Inflammation of the eyelids with crusting of the eyelashes, that may increase the risk of infection or inflammation of the cornea after LASIK.
•  Large pupils. Make sure this evaluation is done in a dark room. Although many people have large pupils, younger patients and patients on certain medications may be particularly prone to having large pupils under dim lighting conditions. Large pupils can cause symptoms such as glare, halos, starbursts, and double vision after surgery. In some patients these symptoms may be debilitating. (Ex: A patient may no longer be able to drive a car at night or in certain weather conditions, such as fog.)
• Thin Corneas. The cornea is the thin clear covering of the eye that is over the iris, the colored part of the eye. Most refractive procedures change the eye’s focusing power by reshaping the cornea (Ex: removing tissue).  Performing a refractive procedure on a cornea that is too thin may result in blinding complications.
• Previous refractive surgery (e.g., RK, PRK, LASIK).  Additional refractive surgery may not be recommended.  The decision to have additional refractive surgery must be made in consultation with your doctor after careful consideration of your unique situation.
• Dry Eyes. Many ophthalmologist tend to neglect this condition.

Questions To Ask Yourself Before Getting LASIK

• Are you a risk taker?

If you’re unsure of your choice, it will make it very difficult for the doctor to operate. Even if 90% of the people who got LASIK surgery came out successful doesn’t mean that you’ll be 100% in luck that your surgery will go smoothly. There are always a chance that you might be in that 10% that the surgery goes unsuccessful but the rate of failure is low. It’s important to prepare yourself for both results. If you’re not able to deal with failure than maybe you should take more time to think it through before going under the laser.

• Will getting LASIK interfere with your career?

There are certain jobs in this world that cannot take people who has had operations/surgeries before. It’s best to make sure and ask your superior a lot of questions on this matter.

• Are you able to afford LASIK?

LASIK surgery is definitely not a bag of chips. It’s important to be sure of your financial situation before you get the surgery. Most medical companies don’t pay for LASIK surgeries anymore as its not a life threatening problem.

• Is your eyesight prescription stable?

Mostly people in the early 20s or younger are still in their growing stage so the prescription varies from year to year. There’re other problems such as getting pregnant, taking medications that may cause fluctuations in vision, or unstable hormones due to diabetes.

• Are you on any medication or have any diseases that may interfere with healing?

Some medications can interfere with the healing process of LASIK surgery so make sure you ask your doctor if LASIK is right for you.

• Are you a pro-sport person such as boxing, wrestling, or martial arts?

Participating in these kind of hardcore sports takes a lot of damage to the face.

• Are you over 18 years old?

It is currently against the law to perform laser eye surgeries on anybody under 18 years old.

Eyeglasses or Contact Lenses? Neither.

Have you ever had to watch a 3D movie and had to stack your 3D glasses on top of your regular eyeglasses so you can see the movie crisp clear and also experience the 3D? If yes, then you should know how troublesome that is. Either your 3D glasses is slipping off your nose or your regular eyeglasses is too high up your nose bridge. Many people can also agree that wearing glasses isn’t as appealing to the public as just showing your entire face without anything covering.

I know there’s always the other option of wearing contact lenses. Contact lenses are in more advantages than eyeglasses but contact lenses still isn’t the best option out there available. Wearing contact lenses makes watching 3D movies a lot easier but doesn’t your eyes get extra watery after staring at at the screen for a really long time? It’s not even just staring at the theater screen, your eyes are one of the 5 senses which is constantly operating throughout the day non-stop expect sleeping. Working in this economy having to get out of bed even before the sun comes up and not getting home until nearly midnight, if your body is tired from the whole day of stress then just imagine how your eyes are feeling. Another problem with contact lenses is the breakage of the lenses. Taking out the whole contact lenses is hard enough, imagine taking out broken pieces of lenses?

What is LASIK?

LASIK stands for Laser-Assisted In Situ Keratomileusis

Laser Eye Surgery is a type of eye surgery to correct myopia, hyperopia, and astigmatism. Laser eye surgery, also known as LASIK, is performed by certified ophthalmologists using a laser to permanently change the shape of the cornea. LASIK is similar to this other surgical eye procedure called photorefractive keratectomy aka PRK. Photorefractive keratectomy is also called Advanced Surface Ablation aka ASA) sometimes. Patients who do PRK tend to recover faster after his/her surgery. Both LASIK and PRK represent advances radial keratotomy in improving vision problems and are alternatives to wearing corrective eyeglasses or contact lenses.