"The FDA called a public meeting in April 2008 to discuss issues concerning patients' experiences with LASIK. Several weeks prior to meeting, the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery (ASCRS) -- a professional group of LASIK and cataract surgeons -- issued a press release announcing findings of a literature review led by Kerry Solomon, M.D. alleging a "95.4% global LASIK satisfaction rate". The full text of the article was not published until April 2009. Nineteen articles representing only 2,199 patients were retained by the authors in this "LASIK world literature review"3.
An inspection of articles cited in the 'global LASIK literature review' reveals alarmingly high LASIK complication rates:
"24% of patients reported glare and night vision problems postoperatively." O'Doherty M, O'Keeffe M, Kelleher C. Five year follow up of laser in situ keratomileusis for all levels of myopia. Br J Ophthalmol 2006;90:20 -3.
"Overall, 30.0% of the subjects reported experiencing halos, 27.2% reported glare, and 24.5% reported starbursts." Bailey MD, Mitchell GL, Dhaliwal DK, et al. Patient satisfaction and visual symptoms after laser in situ keratomileusis. Ophthalmology 2003;110:1371- 8.
"Commonly reported symptoms included eye soreness in 43 patients (44.3%), tearing in 20 (20.8%), itching in 38 (39.6%), and moderate dryness or worse in 28 (20.8%)." Schmidt GW, Yoon M, McGwin G, et al. Evaluation of the relationship between ablation diameter, pupil size, and visual function with vision-specific quality-of-life measures after laser in situ keratomileusis. Arch Ophthalmol 2007;125:1037-42.
"Night vision was considered worse or much worse than before surgery by 33.8% of patients....After surgery, 40.9% of patients reported experiencing more difficulty with night driving than before surgery."Tahzib NG, Bootsma SJ, Eggink FA, Nabar VA, Nuijts RM. Functional outcomes and patient satisfaction after laser in situ keratomileusis for correction of myopia. J Cataract Refract Surg. 2005 Oct;31(10):1943-51.
"29% reported reduced night vision clarity following LASIK and 27% noted more eye dryness following LASIK." CLAO J. 2001 Apr;27(2):84-8. Patient satisfaction after LASIK for myopia. Miller AE, McCulley JP, Bowman RW, Cavanagh HD, Wang XH.
Likely, surgeons are focusing on patient satisfaction to divert attention away from high complication rates inherent in the LASIK procedure.
Physicians have an obligation to place patient welfare over any personal profit motives. However, highly lucrative outpatient surgical procedures such as LASIK eye surgery have created a new breed of physician/entrepreneurs who are willing to simply sell what is profitable to a trusting and unsuspecting public. These 'salesmen' are masquerading as healers."
References
3. Solomon KD, Fernández de Castro LE, Sandoval HP, Biber JM, Groat B, Neff KD, Ying MS, French JW, Donnenfeld ED, Lindstrom RL; Joint LASIK Study Task Force. LASIK world literature review: quality of life and patient satisfaction. Ophthalmology. 2009 Apr;116(4):691-701.
DOWNLOAD Lasik World Literature Review led by Kerry Solomon, M.D
DOWNLOAD Lasik World Literature Review led by Kerry Solomon, M.D
