What is Lasik Eye Surgery ? — Understanding the Refractive Surgery That Could Improve Your Vision
If your vision is starting to slip or you’re tired of wearing glasses or contacts, you may be looking for other solutions, including Lasik eye surgery. This option is important because it offers what could be a permanent improvement to your vision problems. But what exactly is Lasik eye surgery? Before you lay down on the operating table for major refractive surgery, you should fully understand the in and outs of having Lasik eye surgery.
Lasik stands for Laser-Assisted in Situ Keratomileusis and is a refractive surgery procedure that can reduce or eliminate your dependence on contacts and glasses. Lasik eye surgery is a refractive surgery that cannot restore your vision to perfect, but does have the ability to significantly improve your vision, possibly allowing you to go the rest of your life without glasses or contacts. The refractive surgery treatment is near painless and takes only five minutes per eye.
Lasik eye surgery is characterized by an ultraviolet laser light that cuts the cornea of the eye and reshapes it or removes parts of it if it is too large or caps. Refractive surgery permanently changes the shape of the cornea. In order to have perfect or near-perfect vision, your cornea—a thin coating on the surface of your eye—must work in cooperation with your lens to refract light. Improper refraction can result in blurry vision—this means that images will not be properly displayed on your retina and you will not be able to focus on them as well without the aid of glasses or contacts. Refractive surgery will correct or improve this problem and you will not have to depend as heavily on the use sight aids. If you have extremely bad or blurry vision you may need to undergo several Lasik eye surgery treatments.
Lasik eye surgery does help to improve a number of vision problems and the refractive surgery can be used to attempt correction of the following problems: nearsightedness (myopia), farsightedness (hyperopia) and astigmatism.
It is important to understand that certain elements and factors in your life may preclude you from being eligible for refractive surgery. Some of the disqualifiers include:
- You cannot be taking certain prescriptions, including oral prednisone and Accutane.
- Your eyes must be healthy—if you have corneal disease, glaucoma or some other eye disease, you will not be able to receive refractive surgery.
- You cannot have refractive surgery for near and far sightedness (presbyopia) in the same eye.
- You must be in good health—if you have diabetes, lupus or rheumatoid arthritis you may be precluded from the refractive surgery.
While the effects of refractive surgery are permanent, your eyes will still change internally as you grow older; refractive surgery is not recommended for children and in myopic patients, should be put off until their mid-20s.
Lasik eye surgery can be costly and is permanent so it is important to make sure that you are comfortable with your doctor before having the refractive surgery.
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