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141 Comments
- Surefoot, on 10/10/2007, -6/+41LASIK@Home couldn't be easier. Just follow these four easy steps and you'll be seeing clearly before you know it!
http://www.lasikathome.com/foureasysteps.htm - SantaClauz, on 10/10/2007, -3/+34LASIK is actually a lot more versatile than people think it is. I'm only 17 and I had LASIK done back in June. I have to admit that mostly everything he says in the article is true, but for about a week's worth of slight discomfort, it was completely worth it. I'm seeing 20/15 now and I don't have any more problems with halos of light. My biggest complaint was that for the first two days its especially annoying because your eyes are highly light sensitive.
All in all, if you're sick of glasses and can afford the procedure, I highly recommend getting it done. - inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+28"I never should have had that trendy laser surgery. It was great at first but, you know, at the ten-year mark your eyes fall out." - Ned Flanders
- WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -12/+39Thanks, but I'll wait until a treatment is developed that doesn't involve CUTTING a FLAP on your cornea! (that never fully heals)
I will just put up with so much of the quackery that is western medicine...and cutting my eyes is where I draw the line.
Who would like to be the last person to get their eyes cut up....right before the practice is stopped when a new treatment is discovered? Not Me! - praveenmarkandu, on 10/10/2007, -2/+26lasik is not always permanent for some people btw
- maverex, on 10/10/2007, -2/+24If you want to be a fighter pilot, DONOT get LASIK. You cannot fly at high altitudes / G forces. I've asked an Air Force recruiter about this.
- wattznext, on 10/10/2007, -0/+20Haha. "foreseeable future" I get it
- Monolith4, on 10/10/2007, -2/+18"It is said that the flap never fully heals.......so there may be some issue with things like deep-sea diving."
Damnit. Article was getting me interested in LASIK until i read that. Anyone know a good alternative for a diver? Any new techniques being developed? - archlich, on 10/10/2007, -0/+14mod parent up. There is a special procedure for getting lasik that allows you to be a pilot. The surgery involves completely removing the top layer of the cornea.
http://usmilitary.about.com/od/airforce/l/bllasersurgery.htm - mathesonmd, on 10/10/2007, -0/+14As an ophthalmologist, who doesn't happen to perform LASIK, I just say beware of who is performing the procedure. If the doctor gives you a 100% guarantee, he/she may not be trustworthy. If they play down any complications, they may not be trustworthy. Face it, all surgery has risks and complications are often hard to predict and unavoidable. Don't get your decision-making information from anecdotes found on blogs or "lasikinfo.com" type sites that like to generalize their experience to the everyone. I would go see an impartial eye care professional who will not be performing the procedure, but has a good knowledge of the technology, to give you information. Or try the American Academy of Ophthalmology website. Most people can have a good result if they were a good candidate in the first place i.e. not highly near or far sighted, don't have an usually large pupil, no other corneal problems. But nothing in medicine is 100% guaranteed.
- jer2eydevil88, on 10/10/2007, -1/+14Most places offer free corrective surgery if it stops working for you before 10 - 15 years like advertised.
- LucasVB, on 10/10/2007, -2/+14The *****!?
- AnteChronos, on 10/10/2007, -1/+11"All in all, if you're sick of glasses and can afford the procedure, I highly recommend getting it done."
And if you're tired of glasses and *can't* afford LASIK, I highly recommend contacts. Some people have vision so poor that contacts can't provide enough correction, and LASIK can correct for things like multi-axis astigmatism that only hard contacts can correct otherwise, but I know that, if my vision changes, I can always get another prescription for my contacts. And with the silicone hydrogel contacts, you can leave them in for 30 days straight, day and night.
Now, if you want to go swimming without wearing goggles, or you want to be a fighter pilot, then LASIK's the way to go, but I'll stick with contacts for the foreseeable future. - hobbler, on 10/10/2007, -0/+9I was really nervous about getting LASIK done, but my wife bribed me into going with ice cream. Mmm, ice cream! Getting the procedure done really was great, though. My eyesight is so much better now, without the annoyance of wearing contacts. I was a long time contact lens wearer (8 or so years), and I'd reached the point where I was just sick of them, and I could never get a decent glasses prescription. The cost really builds up over time, and in the almost two years, I figure I've ended up saving about half the cost of the lasik in what I would've spent on glasses + contacts over that time.
The only thing I recommend is not driving yourself home, no matter if the doctor says it's okay.
It's also kind of freaky when you're sitting there, wondering what that burning smell is, and realize that it's them burning your eye with the laser. - lbtori, on 10/10/2007, -0/+8I had PRK which doesn't involve a flap, have a look, it might work for you.. A bit longer healing times but it works as well :)
- Crossmenjeff, on 10/10/2007, -6/+13yeah give up diving and watch everything you're missing on the surface or on the discovery channel
- Accutron, on 10/10/2007, -8/+15Why is this poorly written crap on the front page? This person gets LASIK and we care why? Buried for misleading, sensationalist title and shameless plugging of the payment program.
- arjie, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6I read about this in the paper, though I don't remember how far the tech has progressed. In any case, I remembered the name: Orthokeratology, so I could easily get a couple of links:
http://www.allaboutvision.com/contacts/orthok.htm
http://www.orthok.co.uk/orthok.htm
And I suppose you could find it on Wikipedia. - tearor, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6I lost my comment I was working on. Oh well, If you want to change your life for the better, and you can't see the clock across the room to see what time it is, go get this done, immediately, if you have to steal, beg or borrow, this is the one thing in life evreyone should have, good vision, or at least good enough to see your toes.
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6"And with the silicone hydrogel contacts, you can leave them in for 30 days straight, day and night."
You can, but it's not a good idea. When working on a killer project, I was doing 12 to 16 hour days all summer and collapsing into bed without removing my lenses. I wore them for a month straight (replaced monthly), waking up in middle of night with very dry eyes, would put in eye drops but not remove lenses. Well. at the end of the summer I was seeing little rainbows around bright lights. Turned out that my corneas weren't getting enough oxygen and the nerves in the cornea that regulate tears were damaged. (Lasik can do that too.) But that's not the problem. The problem was, the lack of oxygen also caused free-radical damage to my lens, inside the eye, and this was the start of cataracts, an opacification of the lens (not the cornea). Caused when the lens protein cross-links when damaged, so the lens loses clarity. These days, cataract surgery is common, a well-practiced operation, but it involves surgically removing your lenses and replacing them with plastic lenses inside the lens sac. $$$ operation. Moral of story: DON'T overwear contacts for any length of time, and try not to do 30 day stretches. And always always keep the CLs clean and the eye sterile. I always wince when I see anyone use saliva to moisten, bad idea, you can get viruses or bacteria in the eye and an infection from it. - darkane, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7Wasn't there a story not too long ago about a lens that you wear while sleeping that shapes the eye and gives you 20/20 for a full day? I don't think there should be a LASIK story without mentioning this as an option (though it obviously wouldn't treat every type of eye problem). Anybody have a link?
- warriorscot, on 10/10/2007, -2/+8Well the non western method involves sleeping with sand bags on your eyes.
- carpespasm, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5laser pointer and a steady hand
- protoz30, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Go ask your Optometrist or Ophthalmologist about LASEK, not LASIK. If your cornea is thick enough, you may be able to do that procedure instead; it will reshape your cornea rather than creating the flap. athletes usually op for this procedure rather than LASIK because of the flap. good luck and happy diving.
- Floodle, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5I used this and now I can see through walls - is that normal?
- maelstromwar, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5any luck with that? you must be suicidal.
- smeagol30, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5I had Lazor eye surgery by a UK company and no cornea flap cutting. The surface of my eye was merely lazored and the whole process took about 2 minutes. This was about 7 years ago and I have had no problems since... I cant recommend it enough but of couse theres bound to be some people who have issues.
As another chap has already said the week after was uncomfortable as my eyes were really light sensitive (had to wear sunglasses and couldn't even keep my eyes open in daylight for a day after) but to me that is a really small price to pay (apart from the 2k!) for perfect eyesight. I used to hate wearing glasses and contact lenses were fiddly and dried my eyes out.
Theres also the smell of flesh burning during the process which is freaky ;) - lbtori, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Have a look into PRK or LASEK. I had PRK about a month ago and I can see fine now, hardly even get dry eyes and there's no flaps involved. They reshape the cornea which still involves burning bits off but once it heals it's fine.
- Kopiok, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I actually found Contacts to be a bigger pain in the ass than glasses.
- CapeKid, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4"please tell me that's a joke right?"
please tell me THAT'S a joke right? - nashpreds99, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Ive wanted to have the surgery but alas my corneas are too small for the laser to reshape. I was kind of bummed, but my ophthalmologist said implantable contact lenses are going to be a hit like Lasik in the next few years. Apparently, they make a small incision in your lens, insert the contact, and then boom your done! Basically, the new lens sits right inside your eye's lens. One of the good things about it is that the contacts can be removed if needed. It wont permanently screw up your eye like Lasik could possibly do if something happened. All in all, it great to see that there are more options out there and all of them are just going to get better with time.
- TheCaterpillar, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5You had me at "blenderized".
- keimel, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4The author says, in a nutshell, that her vision was 400 times worse than others (20/400) - which is *****.
20/400 simply means that what people see at 400 feet, you have to view at 20 feet. It's pretty bad vision, and in fact, is what MY vision is. I can see things right up close to about 6 inches. After that, it's fuzzy view for everything.
It's more like 20 times worse, but it sure as hell isn't 400 times as bad. Once I read that part, in the very beginning of the article, I took everything else she said with a grain of salt, cause I knew she didn't have fscking clue as to what she was talking about. - rusticdog, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I had mine done in 2001. I had one eye done on a Thursday, one on a Friday, and was out playing pool on Saturday.
There was some discomfort, and some pain, but I had a sleep immediately after (they gave me a sleeping pill before each session, to help me relax) and it was a lot better after waking up. There was no other real recovery time, no hairy tarantulas, just lots of drops to be sure I kept the eyes moist.
However, 6 years on my eyes are already starting to deteriorate, they said that was to be expected, but not until I was around 40 (still 10 years away). I don't need any corrective lenses yet, but especially over the last 18 months I've noticed some things harder to see than they used to be. - oneiroi, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I'm fairly certain that the story doesn't referencing any mistakes, nor him having a problem with diving...just that he heard there can be complications.
- kahlessreborn, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5That alot of effort for something not real or at least not passed by the FDA
- InferiorWang, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Google doesn't turn anything up. It may just be a really ***** bad typo.
- InferiorWang, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Both of my parents had LASEK. My mom was legally blind without glasses or contacts before the procedure and now only needs reading glasses. My dad is in the pharmaceutical business and for a few years sold drugs to ophthalmologists so he had an idea of who the good doctors were to go to. He still had to have one of his eyes done 3 times before they got it just right, but now sees very well.
- rdoger6424, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Western medicine is MUCH better at acute problems than chronic problems.
- specialK16, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Some people find contacts really annoying. Also, I have a couple friends who are allergic to contacts. Myself, I use them all the time, waiting for my mid tweinties so I can have Lasik.
- MadMic23, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I had Lasik just last year, and my vision is great now! My eyes can be a little dry in the morning, but I work in a very dry enivronment which doesn't help. If you want to get freaked out a bit by what the surgery looks like, check out the video on my blog http://lasereyecorrection.blogspot.com/
- benmarvin, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I got Lasik and it made my dick fall off.
- Bluebuilder, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I have had lasik, and I dive frequently. I call BS on this. If you look at the number of LASIK procedures performed each year in the US, the failure rate is exceptionally small. I believe you run a higher chance of getting an infection from your dentist. Sucks for this guy who had a bad experience, but any surgery has it's risks.
- oneiroi, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Calm down, even if it isn't very grammatically correct the story is generally amusing. It also offers details on what I believe is a rather mysterious procedure for most people. Interesting to see it from someone's perspective who had it done.
- gclef, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2As my eye doctor pointed out when I was doing research for LASIK: this is surgery, not buying toothpaste. Chopshop surgery is just scary.
- CeeJayDK, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2WALLHACK!! ;-)
- scabbers, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3How about a pair of glasses?
- mllawso, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2The pressure in your mask isn't going to stay at 1ATM, that's why you have to wear a mask covering the nose and not goggles. You have to equalize your mask just like you have to equalize your ears. I think the main concern with flaps is that a tiny air bubble could get behind the flap at a great depth. If that happens, and you ascend too quickly, that air bubble is going to expand and push the flap away from your eye.
Personally, I don't really see how air could get behind the flap unless you get hit on the head really hard, but there's always the risk. - AstroZombie138, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I had Lasik in 2002 and it worked great. One thing I would mention is that the fees are highly negotiable. This doesn't mean to choose a cheap Dr., but once you have narrowed down your Dr. selection then you can see what you can get. I did a lot of research and found that certain types of equipment used were better and that docs who had done more than 1000 procedures had a much lower complication rate than those that didn't. That cut the list down from about 10 docs to three.
So back to price... Both wanted around $6000 to start and quickly dropped to $4500. Then one mentioned I could get a discount if I had the right insurance. They asked me my insurance company and I told them. This "qualified" me for a discount to $3000 which included all follow ups. They never even asked to see my card and I know they never filed a claim with my insurance because I get all the statements and they didn't even have my subscriber number, etc. The whole process was similar to buying a car to me because you worked with a "consultant" rather than a physician on the front end.
So the point being that you shouldn't necessarily go to the cheapest doc in town, but find some that meet certain criteria and see what you can do. Insurance should be covering this type of thing anyway... - useful, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I had lasik done almost 3 months ago. I can see 20/10 which is a vast improvement from the 20/800 i once was. It took 2 minutes and I recovered in an hour. Besides some dryness and slight haloing at night all is good.
The description the author gave of the experience is almost the same as mine. Although I don't have any problem with reading and my vision is significantly better. The only advice I can give is you get what you pay for and you should be looking at dropping $4000 for someone that knows what they are doing. -
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