How Cataract Surgery Can Help
to Improve Vision

A patient with cataracts usually elects to have cataract surgery, when he or she finally decides their vision is interfering with his/her life, or when a driver learns his/her vision is no longer sufficient to drive. That's not to say patients aren't nervous about it. They frequently are. However, if the vision is bothering them enough they decide to have the procedure.

Cataract surgery is one of the most successful surgeries done.

Surgical Procedures

• The surgery uses ultrasound to liquefy the cataract and suck it out of a "capsular bag" in a procedure called phacoemulsification. Then an artificial lens called an intraocular lens or IOL is inserted into the capsular bag in the same place the cataractous lens occupied prior to its removal.



• The actual surgery will only take seven or eight minutes in the hands of an experienced surgeon.
• The patient is awake during the surgery. However, the anesthesia team often gives a mild tranquilizer to those patients who are extremely nervous. They also put all the eye muscles temporarily "to sleep" so there is no chance the patient will move the eye during the surgery.
• The surgical team will try to leave the patient as free from the need for glasses as is possible by selecting an IOL with the correct power. Nevertheless, some patients will still need glasses after surgery, especially for reading or close work.

Vision is usually good the very next day. Patients frequently marvel about the clarity of vision and especially the brighter colors.

About the Intraocular Lens (IOLs)

• There are new IOLs referred to as "accommodative IOLs" that mimic the way your eye used to be able to focus when you were in your 30's. They promise to be an improvement from the "refractive IOLs" we have been using for the last ten years.
• Accommodative IOLs may greatly reduce or sometimes even eliminate your need for glasses, even for reading or close work. The only accommodative IOL now used in the USA is the Crystalens.
• Standard IOLs are normally covered by insurance. All accommodative IOLs cost an additional premium.

Options for Astigmatism

• For patients with astigmatism there are two possibilities. First is a limbal relaxing incision (LRI), which consists of shallow arc-shaped incisions made near the edge of the cornea. These incisions tend to reduced or sometimes eliminate astigmatism, though they do not work on all patients.
• Patients with high amounts of astigmatism may elect to pay extra for a toric IOL. This is a special IOL that corrects high amounts of astigmatism and will result in a reduced need for glasses after surgery.

Post Surgery...

Post-surgical patients will take antibiotic and anti-inflammatory prescription eye drops for several weeks. It's also necessary to have several follow-up appointments in order to make sure the eye pressure is stable and inflammation resolves normally.

Most surgeons recommend you wait five to six weeks before getting a prescription for new glasses after cataract surgery. This allows the healing to complete and greatly reduces the chance of finding out your new glasses aren't quite right.

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