Lasik Doctors

When considering or choosing to have Lasik surgery the most important decision in the process is choosing the correct Lasik doctor. A patient should have certain questions answered to his satisfaction in order to feel confident with his choice of Lasik doctor.

Ask your Lasik doctor how long he has been performing refractive surgery? His answer should be not less than three years. Also ask how many refractive procedures have been performed in total, excluding mechanical surgeries like RK, ALK, and AK and how many refractive procedures have been performed in the last 12 months? Another very important question to ask your Lasik doctor is how many refractive procedures that he himself has performed does he intend to use for you, with the same equipment, and the same refractive correction that you need. Your Lasik doctor should answer not less than 100. This is a very important question. Even a Lasik doctor who has done thousands of surgeries is a rookie when using new technology, new technique, or a new refractive error correction. A patient does not want eye surgery from a rookie Lasik doctor.

The more information a patient can obtain from his Lasik doctor before undergoing the procedure the more informed decision he can make. Find out what percent of the doctors refractive surgery patients receive vision results of 20/20 or better? About 65% of patients are the norm according to studies. If the Lasik doctor gives a higher number, ask for proof. If a patient has high myopia, high hyperopia, and/or high astigmatism expect the probability of achieving uncorrected 20/20 to be lower.

A patients Lasik doctor should tell a patient what percent of his refractive surgery patients report unresolved complications six months after surgery? This includes objective and subjective complications such as halos, starbursts, dry eye, etc. Less than 3% is the norm according to studies, with less than 0.5% being serious complications that require either ongoing extensive maintenance or another surgery. If the Lasik doctor answers with a lower number, ask for proof. If the Lasik doctor answers with "Zero or an almost never" this should be cause for concern. No Lasik doctor is perfect and no surgical procedure is perfect.

Find out what percentage of refractive surgery candidates does the Lasik doctor decline? A patient should not be surprised if a solid number isn't readily available. The only wrong answer your Lasik doctor could give would be "none". Patients that are being properly screened away from refractive surgery will indicate a Lasik doctor who is conscientious about providing refractive surgery only when it would meet the patient's needs.

When screening a Lasik doctor also find out if he will you provide the names and contact information of at least ten previous patients who have had the exact same surgery with similar refractive error? The Lasik doctor should answer yes, and the doctor should already have such a list compiled. Of course you won't get a list of dissatisfied patients, but these people can tell you what going through the procedure is like. You may want to talk with patients who had surgery recently and some who had surgery several months ago.

These, of course are not the entire list of questions a patient should ask their Lasik eye doctor but just a few of the very important ones that should not be forgotten. A patient should make sure to have all of their questions about the procedure and the Lasik doctor answered to his satisfaction.