Yesterday I had eye surgery. The procedure is called LASEK. There is another procedure called LASIK (with an I instead of E) that many people are familiar with. In LASIK, a laser creates a flap on the cornea, peels it up, and reshapes the cornea to correct near sightedness, far sightedness, or astigmatism. Then the flap is but back in place.
LASEK is similar, but instead of creating a flap, the doctor puts an alcohol solution on the eye which softens the top layer of cells of the cornea. Then he slides the layer aside, the laser reshapes, and then the doctor moves the layer back in place. Sounds awful, huh? Then they put a water-based contact lens on the eye until everything heals up. This is done in cases where the suface of the corneais not thick enough, or, in my case, the surface is not smooth enough.
About 13 years ago I had an eye operation called Radial Keratotomy (RK), which was supposed to correct my near-sightedness and astigmatism -- I had em both. Back in those days, they used a glass-cutter style knife and actually cut a star pattern on the eye. This flattened the cornea to correct vision. It did not work near as well as I had hoped. Within a couple of years I was wearing glasses again. Over time my vision became worse. My eyes had been over-corrected and now I was far-sighted. I still had astigmatism. And now I had deformities (actually scars) on the eye surface because of the RK. That's what I get for always wanting to be on the leading edge (or should I say bleeding edge?) of technology.
Because of the RK problems, my right eye could not be corrected to 20/20 vision, even with glasses.
Laser eye surgery has been around for quite a while now. Dr. Cassidy, of Moretsky & Cassidy in Phoenix, was pretty confident that he could correct my eyes and remove much of the problems caused by the RK I had in the past. So I went for it.
The procedure was a lot different than the RK. I layed under the laser and, since I had anesthesia drops in my eyes (and I was given some Valium) I didn't feel much as I literally watched the whole thing. When the laser did its work I had to stare at red dot in the middle of a white halo light. If I stared and didn't move my eyes then the laser would do the rest. The doctor and his assistant praised me for doing a good job of holding still. They seemed pleased with the result. The procedure took about 15 minutes.
On the way home from the operation (my wife drove), I could already notice an improvement. I was reading street signs and license plates without glasses, even through the medicated contact lenses, sun glasses, and plastic shields that were taped over my eyes. I was supposed to rest and keep my eyes closed most of the day yesterday. I did watch a little TV in the afternoon, but otherwise did as I was supposed to.
I remember that for a few months after the RK procedure I had a lot of discomfort. Plus I had to use drops in my eyes that constricted the pupils to little dots, and that too was painful. This time is different. I have 3 types of medicated drops plus some wetting drops I need to use, but they are not uncomfortable at all. Even the contacts I am wearing are comfortable -- I don't even know they are there. That in itself is weird because I have always had a terrible time wearing contacts. I do feel a bit of a scratchy sensation on the eyes but it it not too bad.
The best part is that I can see pretty good. There is some haze, but that is normal until the contacts are removed by the doctor (which will be done next Wednesday). It will take a couple of months before my vision is stablilized. But I am really encouraged by the results so far. I can read better now than I could with my glasses before. I'll keep you posted on how it goes.