Still experiencing problems five years post-LASIKMar 15 '07 Write an essay on this topic.
Popular Products in Health Aids
The Bottom Line If you've got any of the "red flags" or very bad vision, avoid LASIK. If not, you're probably ok.
I had LASIK eye surgery in January of 2002. Going into the surgery, the power/correction of my soft lenses was -8.50 in both eyes and had been stable for years. My surgeon was well-known and highly recommended. During my pre-op appointments, two red flags came up: dry eyes and thin corneas. Dry eyes had never seemed to bother me, I wore contacts for more than a decade, every single day with no problems. I was assured that while my corneas were thin, they weren't so thin that I wouldn't be able to have a second procedure if necessary. I backed out of the surgery, decided I didn't want to take the chance. At a gut-level, it didn't seem like a good idea. Then my surgeon called me personally and assured me that almost no one has long-term problems when they go in with dry eyes and thin corneas. I figured he was the expert, so I went ahead with the procedure. A day after the surgery, I went back for a post-op appointment and was told I was seeing 20/15, but things never really looked clear to me. I had miserable dryness and couldn't get by without drops a couple times per hour. My vision started to backslide about 8 months after the surgery and I developed an astigmatism in both eyes, which I'd never had before. Soon I was back in glasses, I couldn't tolerate contacts because of the extreme dryness. Over the last five years, I've had tear duct plugs put in to help the dryness and then removed when my eyes wouldn't stop tearing. I've been to countless contact lens fitting appointments to try to find some lenses that work, but still wound up in glasses. The dryness has improved, but I just can't see well with the contacts. My glasses prescription goes up every year. My new eye doctor casually mentioned the other day that after LASIK, the thin areas of the cornea can keep getting thinner, causing the cornea to mishape and vision quality to continually decline. When your vision is very bad to start (as mine was) they have to remove a lot of tissue to reshape the cornea, leaving it very thin. If I had known this, I would have never had LASIK. Dry eyes and thin corneas are big red flags. If you have either going into LASIK, or your vision is very bad to start, I would recommend against it. On the flip side, everyone else I know who has had LASIK is happy with their results. I had a trio of problem areas (very bad vision, dry eyes, thin corneas) and should have been told to avoid it.  |
| Read all comments (3)|Write your own comment |
|
Ads by Google
|
