A lot of people have asked Edlyn and me about our recent experience. Naturally, I can’t advise anyone medically, but I can tell you what our doctor has told us and what it was like for us, how much it cost, the options we were given, the nature of the procedure, the waiver-from-hell that we signed, and so on.
My vision improved from 20/80 and 20/40 to 20/20 and 20/15. My wife’s improved from 20/400 and 20/180 to 20/30 and 20/25. Her’s is still improving by the day.
Congrats, Lib.
My brother and older sister both had it done, but they told me my vision was too poor to make me a candidate. I am 20/400 in one and 20/350 in the other.
Can I ask how old you are? Are you going to need bifocals?
Regards,
Shodan
How much did it cost? I would love to have it done, but I can’t afford to yet.
How did you select a doctor? There’s an eyeglasses place here that advertises it but they’re one of those places that advertises it as “$499 per eye!”, and that seems a little iffy to me.
What kind of restrictions were placed on you as far as reading/driving/whatever after it and for how long?
Is it really nice to be able to see the alarm clock across the room in the middle of the night?
I’m getting zapped this Wednesday, assuming I’m over this funky little disease that just hit me today. My corneas are too thin to get LASIK, so I’m getting PRK, which is basically the same thing, except they don’t cut the little flap to act as a bandage. It’s a little more discomfort, and it takes longer to heal, but I’m still excited.
I’m 48. I don’t need bifocals, but I do need reading glasses now.
When we first met with him, the doc asked us whether we took off our glasses to read. We said yes — we could see close up without them, but not at a distance. He explained that what he was going to do was put our prescription for our glasses in our eyes and that when we looked at reading material, it would look like it used to with our glasses on: blurry.
He explained that there is a condition called presbyopia that hits most people around age 40. Their lenses loose the ability to change focus between closeness and distance. LASIK does not cure presbyopia. Since we no longer would have glasses to take off, we would need reading glasses.
Oh, and one more thing. I would check with your doctor. They’ve done a lot in the last five years. They can improve vision now that was impossible to improve before. Yours is no worse than my wife’s.
Did you get regular LASIK or the new wavefront LASIK? How much did it cost? Did you go to more than one to make sure you didn’t have the “bad eyes” that can’t ever get LASIK? My friend said it was like a 15 minute tattoo on her eyeballs. Thoughts?
Oh, man, yes! Not to mention the TV!
Ours cost $1,425 per eye apiece, for a total of $5,700 together. We got a discount because we carry Blue Cross. Our price included $500 per eye for a new procedure by which they map our eyes with a machine that then feeds data to the LASIK device. It is computer driven. The doctor merely attends the procedure. The computer does all the work. Our price also included all preliminary and follow-up visits plus any corrections, if necessary. Ordinary LASIK would have cost $935 per eye.
We researched for quite some time before settling on a surgeon who has an excellent reputation in our region. He has done many thousands of these surgeries with excellent results.
Good luck!
We had the wavefront. That’s what the extra $500 was for. We endured a battery of tests over the course of several weeks in determining whether we were qualified. My surgery took 16 seconds. My wife’s took 42 seconds.
One of the concerns about LASIK etc. is that a patient will be said to have 20/20 vision if he can read that line on the standard eye charts, and that would make him a success, but he might still have double vision, ghosts, shadows, sensitivity to glare, reduced night vision etc. How does your vision in various circumstances compare with your best pre-surgery vision with glasses/contacts? Another frequent problem seems to be dry eyes, sometimes to a point that drops have to be used frequently throughout the day. Any problems along those lines? Also, did you consider monovision, in which one eye is corrected for distance and the other for reading? If it works the brain merges the two images and essentially chooses the sharpest, eliminating the need for reading glasses, but not everyone adapts well.
I do have halos, but I had them before. They’re a bit more pronounced now, I think. I haven’t had any of the other problems.
One of our prep sessions consisted entirely of watching videos, discussing with a nurse, and reading material about the possible dangers, consequences, and side-effects of the surgery. We even had to take a test to prove that we comprehended what we were told! The waiver that we signed was two long pages of small-print that spelled out not only what might happen — everything from the power going out during surgery to computer error, but stated categorically that there are no guarantees about anything and that things could happen that no one had even thought of.
I haven’t had any dry eye problem, but right now we’re on a very strict regimen of drops that conceptually resembles an HIV coctail. We have to do specific drops in a specific order at specific intervals of time. So our eyes are swimming in medicine practically the whole day.
YAY!
So happy things went well for the both of you.
I had mine done about 6-7 years ago. Don’t recall what my eyesight measurements were, nor what they are currently, but they are at the normal range. It took a couple of weeks for everything to settle down completely, but the improvement was brilliant. No regrets.
Best of everything to you both.
Wado, Washte! Great to hear from you! 
[…happy dance…]
They can diminish after time. Right after I had my LASIK surgery (about 5 years ago) I had halos so bad I thought I was at a light show. Even reflective surfaces (street signs, license plates, windows) would cause a sunburst effect. Thankfully, it’s barely noticeable now. Everything will be fine, I’m sure of it.*
While not 100% sure, it’s just lots of positive thinking.
I asked Washte a while back, and now I have to ask you: what did it FEEL like? During, and after? Itching? Pressure? Stinging? Do you have to fight not to rub your eyes? Did you have any drugs to calm you? Can you continue to have drugs until your eyes are completely healed?
I want to do this SO badly, and I am SO scared. My eye doctor says I’m a great candidate for this, so right now it’s a matter of saving up the cash (my insurance won’t cover it) but I know I am going to get right to the point and panic.
That’s very reassuring, thanks!
We were informed of possible side effects, like scratchiness or itching, but there really has been very little of that. No more than my eyes would itch or feel scratchy before. The only difference is that I’m very careful now about rubbing them. I don’t want to get anywhere near the cornea. There are lots of drops that we have to do for 7 days (and one of them beyond that).
When we arrived at the surgical annex, there were several people in the waiting room being prepped. We were all pretty nervous and chatty, and we all had people who had brought us there. You can’t drive yourself after this is over. They gave us 5 miligram Valiums and covered our heads and feet with some sort of surgical garb. They spread Iodine all around our eyes (for those alergic to shellfish, like me, they used something else, but I can’t remember the name of it). Then they numbed our eyes with numbing drops. They gave each of us kits consisting of a variety of drops, some medicinal and some just for soothing, as well as protective goggles and shades. They explained how we were to use them, and then one by one they began taking us back.
The first room I went into, I had to stare into a machine that mapped my eyes. It took quite a while, maybe ten or fifteen minutes per eye. Then they took me into a room that had a sort of dentist chair and a sort of dentist chair folded down like a bed, where they numbed my eyes some more. They put me in the first one, where I was instructed to look straight ahead while the doctor used a machine to peer into my eyes. He made two small slits in each eye, and I could not feel anything he was doing.
Then they put me on the reclined chair, and I immediately got a mild back cramp. They helped me work it out while they swivelled the machine into place over me. They instructed me to focus on the red light, but told me that if it disappeared, not to chase after it. There were four people in the room: the doctor, his assistant, and two nurses. While they uploaded the disk made in the previous room into the LASIK machine, they gave me instructions like, “If we ask you a question, do not nod or shake your head. Just respond verbally.” And so forth. Every step of the way, they told me what was about to happen.
The first thing they did was to put these devices around my eyes that kept them widely opened. I couldn’t close them if I tried. Then they said that I would feel “some pressure”. Yowzza! It felt like my eyeball was being squeezed in a vice! It was the only part of the whole operation that I would say actually hurt. My wife said it was no big deal for her, but then she’s borne two children. They said that my vision would disappear for a moment, and sure enough it blacked out completely but returned after a few seconds. It was a suction device that allowed the doctor to cut a flap in my cornea based on the two slits he’d made before.
I felt nothing from the cutting, but when he peeled back the flap, everything became bright white and completely blurred. The little red light I had seen before merged into the whiteness. Soon, it came back into focus and I heard tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat while an assistant called out the time: “Sixteen seconds… ten seconds… five seconds…” All the while, tat-tat-tat. I could smell burning flesh. When the tatting stopped, the doctor put my cornea back into place and it seemed like they were squirting liquid in my eyes from all directions. The did the same routine with my other eye. It was all over within a minute or two.
They told me to get up and go back to the first chair. I could hardly see anything at all. It was like looking through muddy seawater. Just general shapes, light and shadow, color — that was it. I groped my way into the chair, and the doctor peered into my eyes again.
“Beautiful,” he said. “Perfect.”
“But I can’t see!” I said, blinking.
“That’s okay. It’ll clear up.”
I went back to the waiting room and they called my wife next. I couldn’t recognize any of the faces in the room. They were all too blurry. By now I had on my googles and shades. The nurse squirted some more drops and instructed me to go home and take a two hour nap. This was very important, she said. And she said to be sure to wear my googles while I slept the first couple of days so I wouldn’t accidentally poke my eye. The cornea usually heals in four hours or so, but can take longer.
When we got home, neither of us could see hardly anything. We lay down and took our prescribed nap. I wook up almost exactly in two hours and the first thing I noticed was the spines on the books acroos the room. I could read them. Boldly, I pulled up my goggles and peeked under them. I had the eyes of an eagle. I could see detail even better than I did with my glasses, although I never thought the prescription for them was quite right anyway. (That was a different doctor.)
I immediately woke up Edlyn, and she blinked as she glanced at the clock. A big smile spread across her face, and she said, “I can see!” We both shrieked and kicked and high-fived and just generally celebrated. We looked all around the room, and then we went outside. We pointed out birds and distant trees to each other, which we both could see. We were like two kids at Christmas. (And in fact, these were our Christmas presents to one another.)
The next morning, we drove to the doctor’s office without our glasses. We noticed the halo effect, but we were just thrilled that we could read the signs. We were competing with each other to see who could read the approaching signs first. Once we got there, it was the same crowd as the day before, and we all exchanged war stories. Most of us had done both eyes with the custom mapping, but one lady had done only one eye. She said the effect was weird. We had considered, but rejected, that option.
There was one lady there with a problem. One of her eyes (she had both of them done) was very scratchy and red. They took her in first, and what became of her we don’t know. But with our deal, the price included all necessary follow-up visits, corrections, and procedures.
My wife took longer to heal than I did. Our eyes felt sort of sore for a time, almost bruised, probably from that squeezing thing. And Edlyn had some scratchiness, but not much. I was fine. Anyway, that’s pretty much it. If I had the chance to do it over again, I definitely would.
Hope you don’t mind if I semi-hijack your thread with some of my own experiences and thoughts, Lib.
First of all, I think researching your doctor is vital. You don’t want to go to Bob’s Discount Mufflers and Laser Surgery. Find out what kind of laser they use. Find out how many eyes the doctor has done. Find out his success rate. The doctor I’m going to, for instance, is one of the most experienced in this part of the country. He teaches other doctors how to do this (training is another thing you should check, BTW. Doctors can literally go to a one-weekend seminar and be techincally qualified to do LASIK). When other doctors screw up their LASIK bad enough so that their patients need cornea transplants (very rare, but it happens), this is the guy who does the cornea transplants for them. I feel very comfortable going to this guy.
He usually charges $1600-1800 per eye, but because I sort of work for the university he teaches at, I got a discount. I’m paying $1250 per eye.
It’s important to make sure they’re using the latest technology. Night halos used to be a common problem, but with modern lasers, they shouldn’t be an issue. Halos happen when your pupils dialate out past the area that was operated on, so that a ring of light gets in through uncorrected cornea tissue. Modern lasers can operate on a much larger diameter of your cornea, larger than your pupils at their most dialated, so that shouldn’t happen any more.
I saw a video of an entire LASIK procedure before going in the first time, so, Lib, when you say it felt like they were squirting water in your eye from all directions, that’s pretty much what they were doing. They rinse your eye copiously so as to make sure there’s nothing under the flap when they close it back up.
Ye gads, eyeball squeezing. taking deep breaths
OK, let’s assume I can handle that. It’s a big assumption for a chicken like me, but we’ll take it. Now what I want to know is, how do you not jerk away when they’re urk doing it? What if you forget and you do follow the red light if it moves?
Thanks to Washte and someone else whose name unfortunately escapes me, I remembered the part about “for just a second, everything went black” and have convinced myself I can take THAT part.
And thank you for detailing all that, too.