Eye Surgery

Common Questions about Eye Surgery

Who should have LASIK eye surgery?

Your doctor is ultimately the highest authority on whether or not you are an acceptable candidate for eye surgery. The best way to determine whether or not you are a qualified candidate for LASIK is to have a private consultation with him or her. However, there are a few basic things that all LASIK patients have in common:

• You should not be pregnant, attempting pregnancy or nursing as the ultraviolet laser associated with the surgery may be detrimental to your child’s health.

• Your vision must also be correctable by more conventional means, such as glasses or contacts. The smaller the correction needed, the easier it is to do. In certain patients with very severe vision problems, there is the chance that your vision may not be correctable to 20/40, which is the minimum needed to receive a driver’s license in most states.
  

I wear bifocals; can I still have LASIK performed?

If you suffer from a combination of both near- and farsightedness you may choose to correct one or the other. Unfortunately, at this time, LASIK surgery is not capable of correcting both problems within the same eye. Most patients select to have their distance vision (nearsightedness) corrected, meaning that they will only need glasses for reading. Some patients, when having LASIK surgery, opt for something called monovision. This means that one eye is corrected for distance vision and the opposite eye is corrected for close vision. This correction, although very effective, is not for everyone and your doctor will be able to give you a trial run with monovision by simply giving you a specially made pair of glasses so that you can make sure that it’s something that you like.

Are the changes made with LASIK surgery permanent?

The changes are permanent as long as your eyes do not continue to change. For most people, distance vision does not continue to worsen after the middle twenties. However, if your eyes continue to change, than an “update” of your LASIK procedure may need to be performed to restore its full effectiveness.