What is laser eye surgery? How laser eye surgery Works?
As you already know, laser eye surgery restores good vision and relieves patients from glasses and contact lenses. Laser surgery can be performed for patients aged 18 to 55 years who suffer:
- Nearsighted from -1.0 to -15.0 diopters
- Hyperopia from +1.0 to 6.0 diopters
- Astigmatism from ± 0.5 to ± 5.0 diopters
With any kind of visual impairment, the image of the surrounding objects does not focus on the retina of the eye. The meaning of laser eye surgery is to change the shape of the cornea in such a way that the image of objects falls exactly on the retina of the eye.
The meaning of laser eye surgery is to change the shape of the cornea so that the image falls exactly on the retina of the eye, as shown in the figure.
The main advantages of laser eye surgery
Every year in the world, several million laser sight correction operations are performed. For more than 20 years of observation, laser eye surgery has proven to be effective and safe. Let's take a look at together, what are the advantages of laser eye surgery:
- Security. The enormous period of observation of patients allows us to reliably talk about the safety, efficacy, and stability of the results of laser eye surgery.
- It is used for all types of visual impairment. If the patient has no contraindications, then laser correction of vision can restore vision almost at all the most common degrees of myopia, hyperopia, and astigmatism, and also with presbyopia.
- Practically any age. Patients aged 18 to 55 are the optimal candidates for this procedure.
- The speed of the operation. The operating time of the laser itself takes a few seconds to a minute, the rest of the time is spent on preparatory procedures and takes 10 minutes per eye.
- The absence of pain at all stages of the operation. Anesthetic drops are instilled in the eyes, which completely block pain sensitivity. The patient feels only touches and a feeling of pressure at some stages of the operation.
- The procedure is performed on an outpatient basis. There is no need to find a patient in a hospital. Within an hour after the operation, the patient goes home.
- Quick recovery of vision. already 2 hours after the operation the patient can evaluate the first results of laser eye surgery. During the first week of vision will stabilize, and the final recovery can be said with the complete healing of the corneal tissue.
- The results of the correction are predictable. The patient has the right to rely on the visual acuity that he has in glasses or lenses before the correction.
- Stability of the operation results. After laser correction of vision, the shape of the cornea persists for life. If the patient does not have progressive myopia, the result of the operation remains for many years.
The main stages of laser eye surgery
Almost all operations for laser correction consist of 3 main stages. The most popular method of laser eye surgery in the world is the Super LASIK operation. On this example, we will consider the essence of laser eye surgery:
The first stage of the operation is the creation of a superficial flap of the cornea with the help of a microkeratome or laser. The flap is taken away as a page of the book.
The second stage of the operation - the laser beam changes the shape of the cornea according to the individual parameters of the patient.
The third stage of the operation is the return of the corneal flap to the initial position and its engraftment without seams and scars.
Types of operations for laser eye surgery
There are several different methods of laser eye surgery. In order of decreasing popularity we will consider the main ones:
- Super LASIK (Super LASIK) - the most common operation to date. Super LASIK is performed according to the individual parameters of each patient, so it gives the best results.
- LASIK (LASIK) is a basic technique that has given a rapid development of laser eye surgery all over the world. It does not take into account the individual features of the structure of the patient's cornea. In modern centers of laser correction of vision, where there is special equipment, it was completely replaced by the Super LASIK operation. In clinics where there is no such equipment, LASIK is still doing it.
- Femto LASIK - the only difference from LASIK is that the cut of the cornea does not microkeratome, but a special femto laser, where the name of the technique came from.
- Femto Super LASIK (Femto Super LASIK) - the method is similar to the standard Femto LASIK, but is performed taking into account the individual characteristics of the patient's eye.
- Presby LASIK (Presby LASIK) - the method takes into account the age-related changes of near vision in patients after 40 years of trying to give a good vision at all distances without glasses.
- PRK (PRK) - the method is used for contraindications to standard procedures. For example, when the patient has a too thin cornea. In PRK, the first 3 days after surgery are rather uncomfortable, while the corneal epithelium is restored.
- Epi-LASIK (Epi-LASIK) - One of the varieties of the standard LASIK procedure, which can sometimes be used with thin corneas, is rarely used.