First a little history about me:
I have been looking into refractive surgery for almost 10 years. No I’m not a procrastinator. I have worn soft contacts for 21 years since I was 20 now you know my age. Being self-conscious about how I looked with my glasses on I ended up wearing my contacts on an average of 12-16 hours a day (not a good thing). What happens when you wear contacts for an extended period and for many years? You develop a condition called "Leukomas"; it’s a neovasularization of the cornea. In layman’s term: Blood vessels around the cornea appear from your eyes not receiving enough oxygen. Now it brings me back to refractive surgery. The only thing doctors offered at that time was RK (Radial Keratotomy) and with my condition that was out, too risky. So I wait…. A few years later I hear about refractive surgery using lasers but not yet FDA approved. So I wait some more… Finally Lasers get the approval but I want to wait and see, too new. In the meantime, my doctor tells me to back off wearing my contacts to just 8 hours a day no more. Seems my eyes are showing signs of contact abuse. My doctor also recommends that I should switch from basic soft to extended wear soft contacts. That seems to work for about 2 years. Then while having a routine eye exam two years later, the doctor discovers that my eyes are not looking so good. I need to start wearing my contact on limited bases. 8 hours a day no weekends. He would like me to come back for a follow up in six months. 6 months pass. I think I am doing just great, not so vain anymore, getting along with wearing glasses on the weekends. I go back for my check up and I am told that now I have developed hazing around my cornea. I need to see a Cornea Specialist. This doctor tells me to limit wearing my contacts to six hours a day and no weekends. Come back in six months. I come back six months later, now it’s June 1999. The results: The haze around my cornea is improving. I ask if my chances of having Lasik surgery are out due to the hazing, and he told me no. He also instructed me to do a lot of research about the doctor I choose to do the surgery. He said ask a lot of questions and don’t think of price, you only have one set of eyes.
I now begin my search. I live in Washington State so I started looking for doctors there. I found a few websites that were real informative: Lasik Institute, Lasik Surgery Bulletin Board, Ask Lasik Doctors.
After 7 months of research I narrow the field down to a couple of Doctors, one was Doctor Lomas of Lomas Eye Care Center. They schedule seminars. I went to their seminar and was totally impressed. First thing they do is take a prescription measurement reading of your glasses. You fill out a brief questionnaire and you’re seated with other Lasik candidates. They tell you about the doctor and all of his experience, which from my research I already knew. Next they show you a movie of the surgery procedure (not actual surgery). The last thing they do is have a question and answer session. They tell you upfront the cost of the procedure, and what out come you should expect from the surgery. For instance, if you are of a higher myopia or have a lot of astigmatism you might need an enhancement (a second surgery). The staff stays with you as long as you have questions. I never once felt rushed. They also offered a tour of their facility where they perform the surgery. But what really impressed me the most with Lomas Eye Care Center was that there were several of his co-workers whom he had performed Lasik surgery on. I had such a good feeling or peace of mind about Dr. Lomas that I signed up for an eye exam the day of the seminar. The staff is not high pressure! They understand that this is a major decision! They want you to be informed and really understand about Lasik, including the pros and cons. Friday the 21st of January I had my eye exam. It is very thorough. It lasts for about 1-½ hours including watching a video of an actual surgery so that you know what to expect. I find out that I am a good candidate even with my blood vessels around my cornea. (Hurray!) They do tell me that there might be some bleeding during surgery because the blood vessels are close to my cornea. I schedule my surgery for Thursday the 27th of January.
Boy am I nervous.
January 27th arrives and off I go for my surgery. I arrive at the doctor’s office at 8:30 am; my surgery is at 9:30 am. You go into an office and go over your consent forms and post-op treatment and answer anymore questions or concerns that you might have. They ask if my husband would like to watch or even tape the surgery on a close circuit TV. My husband thought that was great, he would love to. (We choose to just have him watch I really didn’t want a tape)
I am then given an antibiotic and a Valium. The assistant takes my husband and me to a waiting area for my surgery and stays with us the whole time. Again he asks us if we have and further questions. Now it is my turn. I go into the room and lay down looking up at the laser. I am given numbing drops in both eyes and my left eye is covered. My right eyelashes are tape up and a few minutes later the doctor comes in and talks with me and makes me feel relaxed. He talks to me throughout the surgery explaining what will be happening next. One thing I remember is when the suction ring goes around your eye and just as everything turns dark, I kept wondering if I had shut my eye and I kept saying to myself, open your eye look at the light. Your mind really starts playing tricks on you. Now the only pain I ever experienced was when they were putting the suction ring on. You see, I am one of the few people who have tiny eye lids, so when they were stretching my eye lids open to put the suctions ring on it hurt. As for the surgery, I think going to the dentist to have your teeth cleaned is worse. I mean there is no pain! During my procedure my eye started to bleed which the doctor immediately told me about. This came as no surprise to me as they already told me this might happen. The assistant went out to talk to my husband about what was happening as they wanted to reassure him everything was OK. My left eye did not bleed as much as my right eye did. Now I am not talking about heavy bleeding it’s more like leakage. After surgery your eyes are both covered with bandages and you are led into a room to sit for a few minutes where my husband then joins me. Dr. Lomas comes in, takes my bandages off, and checks my eyes. He tells me that I did great and that I’ll probably see 20/20 tomorrow. He again asks me if I have any questions or concerns. He then reassures me about the bleeding that I had and explains why this happened. I’m given goggles to wear all day and night and I go home. I keep my eyes closed almost all the time. For about 30 minutes I experience a little burning sensation as if you peeled an onion, very tolerable. After that my eyes felt a little dry. I slept most of the day and night. About 5 hours after my surgery I had to lift up my goggles to sneak a peek to see how clear I could see. WOW I can see perfect! I thought better put back my goggles and go to bed and rest.
I awoke the next day took off my goggles and still perfect vision. As a matter of fact I felt as if I didn’t even have surgery. I went in and took a shower keeping my eyes closed and also wearing the goggles and sunglasses they had given me (they don't want you to get anything in your eyes while they're healing). Off to the doctor for my 24 hour post-op. Dr. Lomas checks out my eyes and my left eye is 20/20 and my right eye is 20/25. With both eyes I am 20/20. I then schedule my next appointment for 2/4/00. I almost forgot to share with you my pre-op readings. I was 20/200 in both eyes with my right eye diopter measuring 2.5 and my left eye was 3.0 diopter. My cornea thickness was R. 531 L. 533 and pupils measured 5mm.
As of right now I am two days post-op and feeling great. If anyone reading this would like to ask me questions I will be more than happy to answer you back. If you are wondering why am I writing about my experience. The answer is simple. When I was researching into having Lasik done I wanted to read and know everything I could about the surgery. I am just a normal person just like you. I have no background in the medical field. This is my story, through my eyes. not a doctors perspective. Finally, I wanted to share with you the personal treatment I received through Lomas Eye Care Center. Dr. Lomas and his staff are terrific and I think people should know this who are considering Lasik Surgery. They treated me as an individual, and never as a number. I had they're personal attention at all times. No, they did not ask me to post this story for them, I did this on my own. I hope you enjoyed my story.
Nancy Nash
P.S. Dr. Lomas called me at home the night of my surgery to see how I was doing. How many doctors do that these days?