LASIK/Epi-Lasik Eye Surgery. Have you done it?

[Brandon J.F.]

I'm thinking about getting Epi-Lasik surgery done. It differs from normal LASIK surgery in that there is no corneal flap cut. They use a laser (or blade) to remove the epithelium and then do the correction. You have to wear protective contact lenses a few days while the epithelium grows back. The recovery period is longer than with normal LASIK, but the benefits are that there is less of a risk of any complications with the corneal flap during the operation or post-op (e.g. long term instability of the corneal flap) and it can be done entirely with a laser (no mechanical blade contact).

Have any of your had Epi-Lasik or LASIK surgery or know anyone that has? Any advice or feedback you can offer would be very appreciated.

 

[paul engstrom]

I had Lasik done in 2001. Fantastic. I've since forgotten what glasses and contacts feel like--or that I even wore them. Surgery went great. Very smooth process. Use lots of eye drops (LOTS) for the couple months after the surgery. I had zero complications.

NOTE: I did significant research into the doctor that would be approving me for the procedure and also into the doctor that would be performing the procedure. I was able to find out things about them that led me to believe they were both extremely good at what they were doing and also extremely ethical/trustworthy.

As you, I spent a long time considering the procedure--eyesight is such a precious thing. Good luck with your inquiries into this.

Regards,

Paul

 

[Brandon J.F.]

Thanks for the feedback Paul. What was your vision prior to your operation? My father is blind so I've always been really paranoid about my vision. I'm convinced I want to have surgery I'm just unsure which procedure to get and I'm still researching doctors.

 

[Chris Luker]

I too did it in 2001...
BEST THING I'VE EVER DONE!
My vision was ok with contacts, but after getting lasik, I could see that I really couldn't see very well at all with contacts.
It corrects the little imperfections in your eyes.
Still 20/10 and 20/15!

 

[Brandon J.F.]

Chris, how long did it take you fully recover from the procedure?

 

[Greg Huson]

I can't comment on your specific surgery - but I had ICL surgery last year.
It's sci-fi freaky stuff, and overall I'm pretty happy with it... kinda forget I have it.

Uncorrected, I had glasses or contacts almost all my life- I saw pretty good with my contacts, but see much better with the implants. After the implant surgery they did minor 'touch up' using more 'traditional' lasik - and that was all laser. Recovery time was nothing - 12 hours. But, again, not temp contacts or anything like that. For some reason your eyes heal really fast. (I had a corneal abrasion in my early 20's- it was brutally painful, but even that healed in about 2 days.)

I still wear reading glasses at the computer - but that's a function of age- stiffening muscles, basically. It took me a while to realize I had to use LOWER power reading glasses for the edit bay after the surgery. I spend all day staring at images, tweaking color and contrast, watching for glitches, identifying compression errors... etc... and really would recommend the surgery I had for someone who's a good candidate (no or limited prior surgery, very high myopia, not a candidate for Lasik. - my vision was so bad I wasn't a good candidate for traditional Lasik.)

I had zero problems with the recovery and loved the surgeon. He is very 'LA,' doing TV shows and publicity crap like that, but he was completely frank with me, sympathetic to my concerns about it effecting my business, and never promised a miracle... though he came pretty close. It's not cheap- but really, you want a discount eye surgeon? Not me.

My ONLY issue is minor flaring on my left lens when direct, focused, bright light is pointed into the side of my eye when my iris is wide open - like walking the dog late at night, a street light my catch the edge of the lens. My contacts were WAY worse. My right eye doesn't do that at all. I suppose if I was on set every day (I'm not, we're a post company) it might bother me, but I have to say I completely forget about the minor flare except on a rare, rare occasion.

I get no flaring or noticeable chromatic aberration when working, or at night driving - or anything other than what I said above. I do occasionally get 'dry eye,' and use artificial tears (once month spring/summer, nothing this fall) when the dry-eye effects my vision- but I had that with contacts (disposable gas permeable.) One funny thing that did happen was the first time I chopped an onion after tossing my contacts - I cried! An experience I'd never had before. Honestly, you feel kinda naked at first.

Of course, YMMV, but it's made a big difference in my life.
Hope that helps!

Here's some more research for you:

http://www.visianinfo.com/

http://www.maloneyvision.com/

 

[Zakaree Sandberg]

did it in 2005. now i see 20/12

 

[Darren Orange]

I did it back in 2004. The eye stays pretty sensitive for a long time to anything. So even a water drop or the drops they ask you to put in after burn a lot. One thing to never....never let happen is let a drop of sweat get in your eye. This does not hurt normally but with for the first 3 months after your eye will be super sensitive to this. I am a runner and was running same day and day after surgery, we are talking like 10 miles here. I get some star bursting at night but not bad, it has more to do with the fact that I have lazy eye so my eye does not always focus unless I am focusing. Biggest thing for me is that I now have decent depth perception something I had almost zero of before.

I get dry eye fairly often, because I only have one bad eye that was corrected (my other is perfect like 10 or 15) I can tell that my bad eye is a bit numb feeling if I'm think about it, but has not distracted me.

Would I do it again yes. Hope this helps.

 

[Chris Luker]

Chris, how long did it take you fully recover from the procedure?

Took about a week to not have to wear eye protection at night (so you don't inadvertently scratch your eye and pop open the flaps).
Pain was over in a day.
I was swimming 2 weeks later.

I do see gentle halos around bright lights at night in my right eye. Nothing too bad, and contacts were worse at night than what I see now.

 

[Brandon J.F.]

My ONLY issue is minor flaring on my left lens when direct, focused, bright light is pointed into the side of my eye when my iris is wide open - like walking the dog late at night, a street light my catch the edge of the lens.

I get some star bursting at night but not bad...

I do see gentle halos around bright lights at night in my right eye.

Guys, how bad was your vision before the operation? I've read that people
that need larger corrections are more likely to get haloing than those that need minor corrections. Also, did you guys take Vitamin C pre/post op? Many doctors are recommending that because it apparently greatly reduces the chance of problems with haloing and it speeds up recovery.

Zakaree, great results. I would be thrilled if my vision improves that much!

Thanks for all the feedback guys.

 

[Ivan Kovax]

I'm thinking about getting Epi-Lasik surgery done. It differs from normal LASIK surgery in that there is no corneal flap cut. They use a laser (or blade) to remove the epithelium and then do the correction. You have to wear protective contact lenses a few days while the epithelium grows back. The recovery period is longer than with normal LASIK, but the benefits are that there is less of a risk of any complications with the corneal flap during the operation or post-op (e.g. long term instability of the corneal flap) and it can be done entirely with a laser (no mechanical blade contact).

Have any of your had Epi-Lasik or LASIK surgery or know anyone that has? Any advice or feedback you can offer would be very appreciated.

I too am considering having it done here in Japan, however I have heard that sometimes they can overdo the process and cause far sightedness?

 

[Darren Orange]

My vision in my bad eye was not crazy bad, the issue was that it could get worse! I have lazy eye, so I can't get away without wearing glasses or contact before because my vision would get worse as my brain trys to turn the eye off and not use it. This is part of the reason my vision can never be as sharp as in my good eye because the optic nerve did not develop completely when I was young due to lazy eye. So it's as good as it gets until some stem cells medicine comes about to allow my optic nerve to fully develop.

Now on the other hand yes I do get star bursting, but its not awful. This happens with all types of bright light there is a converse to this however. The bursting will get better over years, it's not something thats 100% in like 3 months. You may also notice that your vision improves also over a mater of years. I have noticed this, but this may be due to lazy eye.

There is one weird thing I have noticed, which isn't bad just weird. My good eye does not like "Black Lights" It feels uncomfortable to view things in black light or harder to get thing to be sharp and in focus. However my bad eye, gets no star bursting from "Black lights" and causes me no discomfort when under only "Black Light" and things seem more clear. I don't fully understand why this is but it is.

Hope this helps.

 

[Greg Huson]

Guys, how bad was your vision before the operation?

Severe myopia, like, I could focus about 2 1/2 or 3" in front of my eye. Glasses did not give me adequate results - but contacts worked pretty good. That's why I'm not an expert on they exact type of surgery you're talking about- I literally have implanted lenses. They would of had to cut too much out of my eye to fix my natural lenses.

And I forgot about the protective 'goggles' at night- I wore those for 4 or 5 days, too.

I think this is easier for people who are used to wearing contacts and such.

 

[Greg Huson]

I too am considering having it done here in Japan, however I have heard that sometimes they can overdo the process and cause far sightedness?

This happened to me - but, again, not exactly the same surgery. On one eye, the lasik 'tweak' was planned, since I had some astigmatism as well... but the other side WAS 'overcorrected' slightly- and then perfected by lasik in that eye, too.

I could not ask for better results - at least until I can get a 'heads up' display or zoom functionality.

By the way, the implant is removable and replaceable. Lasik (which I also had) is not.

 

[Vito DeFilippo]

I had lasik about ten years ago here in Montreal. Frankly, it's a miracle. I was very shortsighted (-8 in both eyes), and always wore glasses/contacts.

I was warned that with such bad vision, I was more likely to have halos around lights at night, and at first it was pretty bad. I couldn't drive at night for a while. But slowly it faded.

I'll never forget when they did the first eye, I had a moment of panic because something felt wrong with my vision. The I realized it was because I could now see properly with that eye. Freaking amazing. The whole thing took about 15 minutes and released me from the hassle of corrective eyewear forever.

Other than a couple of days of sunglasses and drops, and the above mentioned halos that took a few months to fade, it was free of side effects, and I couldn't be happier.

I had the traditional corneal flap, so I can't comment on the other type you mention.

 

[Brandon J.F.]

Thanks to everyone that replied to my post. I decided to go for it. My surgery is in 2 hours I am doing normal LASIK.

 

[Vito DeFilippo]

Let us know how it goes!

 

[Stephen Williams]

Thanks to everyone that replied to my post. I decided to go for it. My surgery is in 2 hours I am doing normal LASIK.

I did it earlier this year in 1 eye, 2 hours later I went shopping, I was told to go home & rest! Zero pain, I was 20:20 the following day, it's regressed slightly, however I can still almost read the entire 20:20 line.

 

[Chris Luker]

I just re-upped my 3rd class medical for my pilot's cert.
20/15 in both eyes more than 10 years later.

 

[Brandon J.F.]

Update:

The surgery went well. It's not really anything I ever want to experience again though. For those unaware here is the step by step:

1. They drug up your eyes so you don't feel anything. The nurse put drops in my eyes around 4 or 5 times.
2. They take you to the operating room and lay you and down position the laser. One issue I had is I didn't fit the damn machine very well. I guess it wasn't built with tall people in mind...
3. The doctor says to look at a light, in my case green, and don't move. Easier said than done...
4. The doctor uses a speculum to open up your eyes Clockwork Orange style.
5. The doctor pushes on your eyeball with something until your vision goes black.
6. Let the cutting begin. I couldn't really tell when he started cutting because you don't feel anything, but pressure, but when he flips back the flap everything goes blurry. It's a very unnerving thing to experience...
7. Now the lasering begins. There is a cracking sound, a few seconds of brigh flashing lights and the pleasant aroma of your eyball burning (smells like burnt hair).
8. Then the doctor washed out my open eyeball which I can is a very strange experience. The first thing that popped in my head while he did it was, "he's waterboarding my eyeball."
9. Now the flap gets closed up, checked for proper alignment with some sort of magnifying glass and a bright light and a protective contact lens was stuck on (not all doctors do this).
10. Now you repeat everything again with the next eye. Except this time I coul feel a slight bit of pain as he cut. I guess the drugs wore off a bit. The pain was not bad at all, but I was quite worried that it was going to get worse as he cut. Fortunately it didn't...
11. After the left eye was finished the nurse helped me up and asked how things looked. The answer: Not that great. Extremely foggy and a bit blurry. The fog is normal, but the blur was partially caused by the protective lens which has a slight correction.
12. Next the nurse took me to my room where I laid in bed for a couple hours and relaxed. The place I went to is kind of a boutique clinic so you get quite good treatment. After surgery you get a bed to sleep and relax in for 2-3 hours.

After a couple hours in bed I went out to eat at a place near the clinic and then went home.

At the exam the next morning everything looked good. I went early to the clinic because when I woke up I found that the protective lens on my right eye was folded. They saw me immediately, pulled out the lenses and checked out the flap. All good, except there is (was?) some inflammation which is normal. My vision was technically 20/20 with my left eye, but not 20/20 in my right probably due to the folder up contact lens. I say the left eye was "technically" 20/20 because while I could read the line it was a little blurry. The doctor says all this will improve dramatically over the next week.

I'm only 3 days post op, but I'm quite pleased with the results already. I have to wear sunglasses everywhere because my eyes are quite light sensitive. This is par for the course and they advise everywhere to wear sunglasses (100% UV blocking) for at least 7 days post op. My night vision sucked the day of the surgery. Lots of haloing and starbursts with bright light sources. This has gotten much better, but still I have some haloing and starbursts. Again, this is all normal at this point.

My vision also does fluctuate a bit. Sometimes things go a little blurry and I have to do a slow blink to kind of "reset" things and then they are sharp focus. I must say when things are in focus, most of the time, it is absolutely beautiful. I don't remember having such sharp vision ever.

One other side effect I have noticed is when I am not wearing my sunglasses (polarized Ray Bans) I seem to not have the same amount of contrast in my vision as usual. This is also supposed to be temporary and is probably related to how light sensitive my eyes are right now.

That's all for now... I'm not really supposed to be spending more than a few minutes looking at a computer screen. I will update this thread as things progress. I have a check up this Friday again. Overall, I have 0 regrets and I am very optimistic about this.