LASIK Eye Surgery

Do as much research as possible before making a decision.

Actual footage of OP’s lasik surgery

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

I don’t know anyone who’s had it that isn’t wearing glasses again. I don’t see the point. Just get contacts

One of my mother’s friends got it and I haven’t beard about any complications.

I had it done 12 years ago. My eyesight is getting worse, but it’s not bad enough for another surgery. I do have more floaters than I used to. I would do it again.

Yes and yes. Did it 15 years ago and then just recently again. Don't go the cheap route--go to the best.

I had it done 2 years ago and I haven't had any complications. I recommend it.

Beard = heard

If you get it, wait until your 30’s when your vision has stabilized. Most people who talk about it not lasting had it done when they were in the 20’s. Vision can continue to change in your 20’s.

I had it done 18 years ago. No problems. At 49, though, I'm noticing some regression. My sister's lasted 5 years before she needed glasses again.

I know several people who got it 20+ years ago and their vision is still great, except for one who needs readers when reading (which is not unheard of at 50).

Needing readers can't be prevented (yet). Any good LASIK doctor will advise you that you may still need readers as you enter middle age regardless of how successful the surgery is.

It's OK for a very narrow subset of eye problems and always has to redone eventually. Which can be decades, so it's not that bad.

My friend got it. Then she died.

I had it done in 2000 and it was the best money I've ever spent. I was extremely nearsighted and had astigmatism. The MD corrected my vision to about 20/40, which was fantastic for me, and also adjusted each eye to compensate for distance and reading. Now, 20 years later, I am just starting to notice my distance vision is getting a little weak. I don't need glasses yet for driving.

I had it done and I am still very happy with the results

Plus they give you a Valium before the procedure so it’s a win-win!!!

No 2020 vision jokes? I'm disappointed in you, DL.

[quote]I had it done in 2000 and it was the best money I've ever spent.

How sad.

R13 That was my point...

^ I know, I was adding to your comment. It's a simple test of whether you're in good hands.

Perfectly safe.

I had something called Visian ICL surgery at age 30, 7 years ago. My eyesight was so bad I didn't qualify for Lasik. Visian is implantable contact lenses, and the procedure included follow-up lasik to correct an astigmatism in one eye I wanted. Back then the procedure was relatively cutting edge and was not covered by insurance. Best 6k I ever spent. I have perfect vision and other than dry eyes in the morning and some occasional haloing at night I've had no problems. No more glasses, contacts or eye exams. The procedure is able to be reversed unlike Lasik. I highly recommend it. I was told I would still need reading glasses when I hit my 40s but so far so good.

My cousin’s husband does LASIK but he wears glasses. He would not recommend it to a family member. There are plenty of side effects, such as night “haloing” which get worse with time. Please do your research.

Had it done in 2008 for a mill in So Cal for $500.

Recovery lasted maybe 3 days, no problems. Vision has declined a nominal albeit reasonable amount in 12 years.

^At a mill. There office in Compton's machine broke down on the day of my appointment but they rescheduled me for their San Diego office the same day.

Drove down as my friend lived there and I recovered at his place.

I was younger (32) and fearless then.

R24, I never had any side effects. No haloing, no dry eyes after the recovery period. Same with the several people I recommended the surgery to. In fairness, I know one person with vision problems after LASIK, but she had issues that couldn't have been corrected by LASIK anyway. I think she got taken in by a bad doctor.

Don’t go to a guy off a radio ad. Avoid Dr Della Russo in NY/NJ.

Expect dry eye for the rest of your life.

I had LASIK and I certainly didn't have "dry eye for the rest of my life"

My eyes are fine

I had it back in 1997. Best thing I ever did for myself. And it was EXPENSIVE back then.

[quote] I had it done 12 years ago. My eyesight is getting worse, but it’s not bad enough for another surgery. I do have more floaters than I used to.

The surgery made you poop more?

If you do it, get wavefront... it's worth every penny... but have them correct you to be slightly nearsighted if you want to avoid reading glasses in your 40s.

Wavefront lasik reduces higher-order aberrations. HOAs are what cause some people to be able to read "20/20", yet complain of poor visual acuity.

Alternatively, consider wavefront scleral RGP contacts. You can get them in Dallas (Dr. Gemoules), Miami (Dr. Boshnick), and a few other cities. Scleral contacts look scary, but are MORE comfortable than soft lenses (more oxygen, don't dry out) & offer better acuity.

I had it done around 2006 and had the choice of PRK or Lasik. Went for PRK because the Air Force disqualifies pilots who have had Lasik. PRK requires a week of recovery but there no cutting, so the cornea is not weakened.

R33 interesting. So no issues with PRK?

I had PRK in 2001. I ended up with good results, but the first few weeks of recovery were horrific

For the first 2 days, I was for all intents & purposes legally blind. I couldn't read anything with letters smaller than an inch or two high.

For about a week and a half, I couldn't reliably read books or a computer due to swelling randomly throwing one or both eyes out of focus... and the next 3-4 weeks were almost as bad. It took about 4 months for the starbursts & secondary astigmatism to mostly go away.

In retrospect, I wish I'd pre-purchased a set of trial lenses & frame, so I could have made myself temporary glasses & swapped the lenses as my vision changed instead of being helplessly blind. They wouldn't have mattered for the first few days, but would have made a BIG difference during the first month or two (when I wasn't seeing well enough to not need glasses, but was changing too rapidly to GET regular glasses to wear in the meantime).

Most people who are naturally nearsighted are happier (long-term) with astigmatism-free 20/32-20/36 distance vision (visual acuity equivalent to 20/12 or 20/15, but with 6" to 10-16 foot focal depth vs 18" to 40-foot focal depth), because it ultimately postpones the need for reading glasses.

As you age, your distance vision remains mostly constant, but you progressively lose your ability to focus on nearby objects. By age 40, you'll lose at least a diopter of accommodation. If you're nearsighted, you'll barely notice, because it affects your ability to see things 1-4 inches away. With "normal" vision, you could barely focus in to 9" anyway, so YOU'D lose your ability to focus on things closer than 10-12" right from the start.

Long story short, if laser surgery corrects your astigmatism & leaves you nearsighted, you'll end up needing glasses to read, but probably won't *need* them for other activities... and one pair of single-vision reading glasses will be good enough to handle everything between books and a computer monitor. If instead the surgeon optimizes for distance vision, you might need TRIFOCALS just to deal with books, computers, and intermediate/far distances. Long-term, astigmatism-free slight myopia (~0.5 to 1 diopter) is usually preferable.

I have never seen ophthalmologist around here wearing contact lens or having LASIK done on their eyes, ever.

And my sister always complains about her eyes post-LASIK too. Once in a while if she doesn't get enough sleep, her eyes will feel like they are being hammered. This symptom never happened prior to laser surgery.

Detroit meteorologist Jessica Starr's death by suicide puts focus on Lasik safety

R35, if you are near-sighted, you don’t need reading glasses. I need glasses for distance, ie tv, but take them off to read. Did you mean “laser surgery corrects your astigmatism & leaves you farsighted”?

I had it done 8 years ago in my mid-40s. Totally worth it. I agree with above posters who say don't go cheap. I had it done by one of the best surgeons in the country. I could have had it done cheaper, but I wanted it done right. I did have a lot of discussion about what I wanted. I wanted my distance vision and understood I'd need reading glasses someday if that's the route I went, which I now need. They could do bifocal, but I hated the blurriness of bifocal contacts, so we went with distance vision. I got corrected to 20/15 in both eyes and had zero side effects. It was totally worth the money to me.

I have had other surgeries before. But the Lasik scares the shit out of me; the actual procedure, AND the potential side effects. I've been wearing glasses for thirty-seven years, could definitely benefit if I went through with it however.

I had PRK (precursor to LASIK) 27 years ago and still don't need reading glasses even though I'm now in my 50's.

If my vision did begin to deteriorate now I'd probably opt for multi-focal lens implants as laser surgery doesn't work well for reading vision. If I go with that option I won't ever need major cataract surgery.

My Husband had the implants 5 years ago and has only needed a quick 10 second YAG laser blast to get rid of a little Posterior capsule opacification.

Go to a good Clinic/Doctor if you are considering any eye surgery.

r37, you'd eventually need reading glasses due to presbyopia, even IF nearsighted, unless your natural cycloplegic focal plane were ~10-15" away... which would be EXTRAORDINARILY nearsighted.

At 40, you have 3-5 diopters of accommodation left. At 50, you have 2-3. At 60, ~1-2. At 70+, you're lucky to have 1.

Each diopter cuts the minimum focal distance you can see clearly in half. Suppose your natural cycloplegic focal plane is ~120" (10 feet). With 1d accommodation, you could focus 60" to 120". With 2d, you could focus 30" to 120". With 3d, 15-120". But... if your plane is 192" (16 feet), your 1d/2d/3d would be 96", 48", and 24". So once you fell below 4 diopters of accommodation, you'd struggle to focus on anything closer than arm's length.

On the other hand, if you were myopic enough for 30" to be your cycloplegic focal plane, you'd be able to focus on 15" even after age 60.

IMHO, the ideal is probably ~10-12 feet... good enough to see across a room, but still able to focus on a computer monitor with 2d accommodation.

My husband has it done 20 years ago. His distance vision was terrible. It was corrected to 20/20. That lasted for 18 years. He now has some weak (er than mine) glasses for driving after dark; he's at 20/30, 20/40 now, but it will worsen with age.

I actually watched it on the screen through a window. It was horrifying, but within 12 hours, he could see pretty well. Within 72 hours, it was perfect. Eyeballs heal very fast.

If you have a stable prescription for a couple of years and hate wearing glasses or contacts, go for it. Complications are rare, and usually due to non adherence to recovery directions.

Too much risk for me. Look at Kathy Griffins fucked up eyes.

There's a whole lot more about Kathy Griffin that's fucked up other than her eyes.

I did it (wavefront lasik) and had complications. For a while, there'd sometimes be a 'rip' when I opened my right eye in the morning and it would hurt like hell. But eyes heal fast and there'd be no sign of it by the time I got to the optometrist. I tried various ointments and drops, but nothing helped. Eventually the surgeon did PRK on that eye (wasn't bad) and that fixed it.

Vision is pretty good 20 years later. I was almost blind previously and couldn't see in the shower or when I woke up in the morning. Even with all of the complications, it's improved my quality of life immensely and I'm glad I did it.

I had the ICL procedure done like R23 when I was in my late twenties and I love it and have had no issues so far. I went to look into LASIK but they told me I didn’t have enough surface eye tissue for the surgery to be of any success and pointed me towards the ICL route.

Ya okay, r41, don’t really understand what you wrote but I -am- nearsighted—not too bad -3.0 and -3.50 or so, single vision lenses. Right now I’m reading this webpage without my glasses and it’s 8 pt type according to my type gauge and I’m holding my phone 14” away (I measured) and I’m well into your ~ 1-2 diopter age range. I do have a pair that I wear if I’m doing precise work on the computer and of course, my “real” glasses for watching tv and everything else.

r47, try this: see how far away you can hold a page with 10-point text and still read it in dim light.

Now cut the distance in half. Then do it again.

The result is approximately how close (without glasses) you'll be able to focus on 10-point text after age 60.

Basically, as your eyes lose their ability to accommodate, each inch of additional "near" vision comes at the opportunity cost of SEVERAL inches of distance vision. If you can see clearly between 20" and 160" & you wear glasses to move the near point down to 12 inches, gaining 8 inches of near vision costs the loss of 32-64" of distance vision. How you optimize the position the diopters you have left is up to you (or your doctor, if you don't express a preference).

(Sorry this is all off topic for lasik). R48, okay thanks. Also, since you know a lot about this, what is your opinion of eye tests: the kind where you look through the mask? hanging in front of your face and the ophthalmologist flips the lenses and asks, is this clearer or this? VS the machine like a double microscope that you look into and the image you see automatically zooms in and out of focus until it finally stops. Which is more accurate?

I'm not R48, but I think that the machine provides different measurements because of two factors: it is done in a dark room and you try really hard, working your optic muscles. Try this next time: relax your eyes and that machine will still spit out a prescription even if you do not focus on the object(s). In the exam room, there is a lot of light and educated guessing based on remembering shapes.

R42, my vision improved immediately. My eyes had gotten so bad I couldn't see more that a foot without my glasses or contacts, and immediately after the surgery I could see well enough for at least 10 feet. I literally sat up and said "holy shit, it worked!" I remember the doctor and tech laughing at me. A friend took me home, but even with the welder-grade sunglasses they gave me, I could have made it by myself. Day by day I noticed a rapid improvement as my eyes healed. I also had astigmatism and terrible night vision, also fully corrected.

Once my eyes fully healed a few later I was at 20/15 vision. That lasted a good 5 years, then my vision settled to about 20/20 for another 10 years. In the past year I noticed my distance vision had deteriorated again. Not so bad I couldn't manage, but it was enough of a nuisance that it was worth it to me to get the surgery again. To protect my reading, my doctor only re-corrected one eye. It's a little weird sometimes, but luckily the difference between my 2 eyes isn't bad so it's manageable. And my reading vision is still super sharp.

I was very fortunate in that I was a perfect candidate for the surgery (no glaucoma risk, no other eyes issues other than the rapidly advancing myopia which had stabilized and astigmatism, otherwise healthy, etc), but honestly it all comes down to finding a good ethical doctor. I said above and can't stress enough, don't go the cheap route, don't use offices that are running like a surgery factory. Good doctors will be honest and tell you the risks if you're a good candidate but also tell you if you're not a good candidate and what your other options are.

One reason for the divergence between autorefractor & phoropter results is, if you have too big of a difference between the lens power of your left & right eyes, it causes differences in apparent image size that will cause nausea, headaches, and screw up your binocular vision & depth perception. So if your eyes have a huge difference, one or both will end up compromised (so one or both ends up blurry, but you have working binocular vision).

With contacts, implants, and laser surgery, it's not as big of a problem. Sometimes, if you have a big difference,they'll SUGGEST wearing one contact with glasses (esp. if you need glasses for presbyopia).

An alternative is spending a few hundred dollars more for glasses with lenses made by Shaw (see link). Supposedly, they "look thick", but have better optics than normal cheap lenses & avoid image-size problems (if one eye is very different from the other). They're really a variant of digital freeform lenses... optimized for performance over aesthetics. They're not for everyone, but engineers in particular tend to really love them (because the lenses ARE an engineering triumph, untainted & uncompromised by banal fashion concerns).

Fetch my glasses! *glug*

I had Lasik surgery in 2000, having used contacts for years before that. I hated contacts, though, and while I was meticulous about cleaning and storage they always gave me (minor) trouble, my eyes would become red and watery if I were near cigarette smoke, or pets, or certain irritants. Drops didn't do much and I ended up popping them out for a rinse a couple of times during the day. Worse than anything, though, was if I fell asleep wearing them my eyes would be sore and especially sensitive for a day or two. Flying I would have to take them out and put them back in in a dodgy airplane toilet.

The idea that I could go without contacts was very appealing. My vision was poor so eyeglasses while, I didn't mind the look of them, were a bother and it seemed my vision all through my thirties required frequent adjustments to my prescription.

The procedure was a bit creepy. I usually need a strong dose of any medicine and likewise for anaesthesia. The doctor turned into a testy prick when I kept flinching from feeling the process. He insisted that I shouldn't feel anything and I insisted I felt everything; he tested my reaction and I was right. Another pill and a delay and then it was okay but uncomfortable, whether because of still having too much feeling or from the experience of the dickhead doctor shouting at me.

Bad (if highly acclaimed) doctor aside, the result was brilliant. And remains so. I could see so much better than with contacts, the maintenance and irritation issues were gone. I could fall asleep watching TV and wake up a half hour later without feeling that someone had rubbed my eyes with sandpaper. I didn't have that micro-second delay of changes in focus that came with contacts. I saw with eyes better than I ever remembered.

My vision has degenerated a little. But I can still do well with eye charts , just not as perfect as before. Would I do it again? Maybe, maybe not. Assuming that if my vision problems progress they will be a fraction of my old problem, I would probably try eyeglasses and see how that goes. In the years since I had the surgery, I now wear glasses for reading so am well in the habit. I suppose the nuisance would be switching glasses for different tasks.

So yes, except for a doctor who turned out to be a dickhead, the results made a huge and positive difference for me.

r29

They are full of semen now.

I know people who have done it but I wouldn’t personally. I just don’t mind wearing glasses. And now that I have transitions lenses I would really miss them if I didn’t have them.

Depends on where you live. Glasses in the winter are really annoying when they fog up going from cold outside to warm inside. Add the current necessity of wearing a mask, now they fog up outside too requiring fiddling with the nose pieces of both. I’ve just ordered new glasses online and looked for ones that had a really tiny earpiece (the part that goes behind the ear) because with most styles it’s large enough to interfere with mask wearing.