During treatment for cataracts – the most common form of surgery for eyes – the ophthalmologist removes the cloudy natural lens of the eye and replaces it with an artificial lens to rectify the optical impairment and loss of vision that the cataract has caused. Cataract surgery is the most commonly performed type of surgery for eyes and remarkably is in fact the most commonly performed surgical procedure in the whole of medicine.
Close behind cataract surgery comes laser eye surgery using either Lasik, Lasek or Epi-Lasik. The different laser eye surgery technologies each work in slightly different ways and each have a different repertoire of benefits and disadvantages – for example the amount of time required to perform the surgery, discomfort after the surgical procedure and recovery time will depend on which eye laser technique has been chosen. There are considerable differences between Lasik and Lasek not so much in any discomfort appreciated by the patient during the procedure (virtually none) or in the time taken to do the procedure (only a negligible difference, Lasek being slightly quicker) but in the amount of pain/discomfort suffered by the patient after the laser eye surgery procedure (negligible for Lasik but unfortunately significant for Lasek) and the amount of time it takes for vision to become crisp and sharp – which is the entire purpose of laser eye surgery! In Lasik, clear vision is obtained within a few hours and certainly within a day of the successful laser eye surgery procedure.
In Lasek the disturbance to the surface lining of the cornea of the eye (known as the ‘cornea epithelium’) causes a much slower recovery time. Frequently vision is blurred for at least a few days after the procedure and the blurring of vision can last for significantly longer.
If you believe that you have an eye disorder for which any of the eye surgery technologies offered by Eyesite surgeon Dr Simon Levy may be helpful please contact Eyesite either by phone or email.
