What you need to know about Lasik

Many people who require vision correction have been actively seeking a safe alternative to Lasik vision correction surgery.  Although not well publicized, many post-op Lasik patients complain of halos and streaks around lights at night.  In some cases this disturbance is so severe that the patient cannot drive at night.  Other Lasik patients report decreases in contrast sensitivity and dry eyes.  It is interesting to note that in spite of  Lasik-induced conditions that result in quality of life decreases, many of these patients are reported as “successful” because they have a significant improvement in their visual acuity.  Therefore, the incidence of occurrence of these problems is not properly reported. 

What is even more disturbing about Lasik is that we are starting to see patients returning three, four and five years post-Lasik with reoccurring nearsightedness.  This is a totally unexpected result.  The truth is that all of the mechanisms that cause an individual to become nearsighted are not well known.  Most theories about nearsightedness point to genetic factors, how a person uses their eyes and a person’s “visual experience” as causes for nearsighted development.  None of these possibilities have anything to do with the curvature of the cornea.  All Lasik does is change the corneal curvature. Many Lasik surgeons talk about doing “touch-ups” or “enhancements” on these patients.  Which brings up the following questions:  How many surgeries will these patients need in their lifetime?  How many surgeries can safely be done on the same eye?  Will these surgeries stop or prevent the problem?  What is the long-term effect of performing multiple surgeries on the corneal tissue? 

Indeed, what is the long-term effect of removing corneal tissue with a laser, period?  The truth is NOBODY KNOWS! 

One answer to all of these concerns is non-surgical 30-day continuous wear soft contact lenses.  This will give a patient safe, 24-hour vision without all the hassle of regular soft lenses and the risks associated with Lasik. 

For Full Disclosure on Lasik Surgery and its Associated problems go to:

www.surgicaleyes.org 

The NEW 30-day continuous wear soft contact lenses represent the next generation in soft contact lens technology.  These lenses were approved by the Food & Drug Administration for 30-days continuous wear in November 2001.  They have been available in Canada and Europe since 1997.  The lenses are made with a new material never before used for soft contact lenses.  The material is a water loving plastic with a silicone base.  Silicone is 100% permeable to oxygen.  The NEW lenses are five to six times more permeable to oxygen then conventional soft contact lenses. (e.g. Acuvue, Focus, BioMedics, etc.) 

The cornea, the clear window on the front surface of the eye, does 70% of the focusing for the visual system.  It is the most unique tissue in the body in that it maintains perfect clarity and is absent of blood vessels.  How then do the corneal cells receive nourishment, that is, oxygen?  When the eyes are open, oxygen from the atmosphere dissolves in the tears and then diffuses into the cornea nourishing the front layers of the corneal tissue.  The back layers are nourished by the aqueous fluid inside the eye.  With a contact lens on the eye, the oxygen must diffuse through the lens before it reaches the cornea.  Therefore, the permeability of the contact lens material to oxygen is critical to successful contact lens wear.  This is especially so during sleep when oxygen levels are diminished because of the closed eye environment.  With the eyes closed, oxygen from the blood vessels on the back of the eyelids must diffuse into the cornea.  This makes the oxygen permeability of the soft contact lens material even more critical. 

The oxygen permeability of the NEW 30-day continuous wear soft contact lenses is even greater then clinical research indicates is safe for wear during sleep.  In fact, during sleep measurements of the oxygen uptake of the corneal tissue with the NEW lenses on the eyes is the same as the oxygen uptake with the lenses off the eyes.  It’s as though there were no lenses on the eyes.  The oxygen permeability of conventional soft contact lenses makes it risky to sleep with these lenses on the eyes.  Sleeping in conventional lenses on a regular basis puts the eyes at risk for corneal swelling which over the long term can steepen the cornea and increase nearsightedness, cause new blood vessel growth into the corneal tissue which can eventually reduce vision, corneal abrasions, corneal infections and corneal ulcers.  All of these conditions can be traced to lack of oxygen due to the low oxygen permeability of conventional soft contact lenses.  The risk of these conditions occurring is drastically reduced with the NEW 30-day continuous wear soft contact lenses.

So we now have a safe alternative to Lasik surgery, 24-hour vision without the risk of surgery and without the hassle and risk of conventional soft contact lenses.