
Making better contact lenses - rbanffy
http://cen.acs.org/articles/95/i13/Making-better-contact-lenses.html
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jogundas
Interesting article, showing how important material science is for improving
our lives.

I was surprised to read "older customers need a range of multifocal options".
Did not know that multifocal contact lenses even existed!

Also, it really is a pity that only glasses and contact lenses are available
for people with myopia, laser surgery having a high risk of various
complications, most prominently eye dryness.

~~~
secure
Eye dryness is only a temporary side-effect from laser eye surgery (as are
halo effects and increased light sensitivity), which can easily be treated.

There are a few actual complications, but they are rarer than complications
from wearing contacts (depending to a certain extent on the clinic, of
course).

~~~
J-dawg
What worries me about LASIK is that there is no agreed definition of what
constitutes a successful surgery.

I see adverts with claims like "98% of our patients see 20/20 or better after
surgery". I feel like this is disingenuous and taking advantage of the fact
that "20/20" is perceived as the gold standard for vision.

In fact many glasses and contacts wearers achieve 20/15 or 20/10 vision after
correction, so the advert is telling me nothing about my chances of my best-
corrected vision after surgery being as good as it is now. Plus there's a
chance that LASIK might leave me with good vision but other side effects like
dryness or haloes. AND there's the 2% chance they actually admit to that I'll
have worse than 20/20 vision.

I don't know, maybe some people are so happy to throw away their glasses for
ever that they'll put up with slightly worse vision and other side effects.
I'm just not sure yet whether I'm one of them.

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bryanculver
I had LASEK (a less invasive, longer recovery option to LASIK) a few years
ago.

My suggestion is if you are at all interested in the procedure, and I would
HIGHLY recommend it, is to find a doctor that performs both styles of
procedures, will educate you fully on the pros and cons of both, and will
offer recommendations with quantitative reasoning. I went with the LASEK route
for many reasons, however my cornea in one eye was too thin to support the
correction needed for LASIK with the number of microns lost due to the scalpel
incision.

The largest issues are that the outcomes of LASIK/LASEK are quasi-permanent
and that there are many more variables involved than just an eye exam,
including your own calmness during the procedure.

My doctor offered, as long as the eye can support the number of microns lost
due to the correction, to perform a followup surgery if results ended up being
poorer than 20/30 after the first surgery, free of charge. It took a few days
before I could see the results (an issue with the method of procedure) however
I resulted with 20/20 in one eye and 20/15 in the other.

~~~
ada1981
Agreed! LASEK is the solution that I've found to be the best for me and for
the majority of people who look into it.

As mentioned above, I feel like I ought to be evangelical about this as the
quality of life increase is incredible.

Read my previous comments and if you want more info or an intro reach out >>
anthony at 175g com

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ada1981
This came up earlier this week, but wanted to repost it here since so many of
you reached out about wanting to know more....

After extensive research on all options, I found LASEK (not LASIK) to be the
safest, healthiest, highest quality and best option.

Here is my reply before...

If you get LASEK vs. LASIK halos aren't a problem. I had LASEK done perhaps 8
years ago, and my eyes went from 20/400 to better than 20/15 overnight.

The entire procedure was incredible including an HD prescription profile
generated by scanning your entire eye. This is 10-20x more accurate a
prescription than is possible with the standard methods.

The process is $4k-$5k but with financing comes down to about the same you
spend on glasses or contacts annually. No risk of halos as there is no "flap"
cut like with LASIK, no chance it will come loose, and more accurate vision
than you could ever achieve with lenses.

The quality of life upgrade is incredible, no scratchy eyes, no falling asleep
and waking up with stinging eyes, and for sports it's incredible.

I can't explain what going from 20/400 to 20/15 is like, but basically I
walked around manhattan for 6 months feeling like I was on LSD in awe of being
able to see the mortar between bricks on the tops of buildings.

I found the best LASEK surgeon in the country and have brought in friends /
CEOs from other states and introduced them with incredible results.

If anyone wants more info, an intro, etc. let me know and I can probably get
you $500 or $1k off if you end up doing it.

Anthony at 175g dot com

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antisthenes
I've seen you make the same exact post in the last vision related thread.

Please stop shilling for whomever it is.

The main risk associated with these surgeries is that there's no "preview" to
check if your vision will be better or worse than your current contact-
corrected vision.

If it's worse - then by _my_ definition, the procedure is a failure and that's
the only thing I care about. The risk that it's worse isn't the same as the
risk that is commonly defined in the success of the procedure - it's much
higher.

~~~
amalag
These surgeries are absolutely dangerous. Doesn't help with people like this
giving their email addresses and looking for referral bonuses.

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ada1981
Define "dangerous" and cite some sort of research, please.

I'm offering my personal experience and offering to answer people's questions
because I had such a positive experience.

And at someone's request, introducing them to the person I used personally
after a pretty exhaustive search into how to get "super human eyes".

It seems to me to pretty standard human behavior to want to share something
that enhances your life with others.

~~~
amalag
Dude you are trying to get a commission by referring your eye center. We get
it.

Don't be an idiot and claim these eye surgeries are perfectly safe. They have
serious risks, including blindness.

I am very happy with my PRK, but my colleague had his eyes bulging out because
of excessive pressure and had some eye damage. But such testimonials are not
so useful. Go into these surgeries expecting you could be the in the minority
of people who have a complication.

~~~
ada1981
I'm simply asking you to provide any sort of statistics on the "danger" of
these surgeries, which you refuse to do.

