laser eye surgery. anyone done it?
 

I'm seriously sick of wearing contacts and glasses for the past 20+ years. I'm considering getting lasik, and I've heard prices have come down considerably in recent years.

So my question is, has anyone done it? Did everything work out as planned? And if so, where did you do it? And how much did it cost?

I've heard of places that charge as low as $1500 and places that are $8000. That seems like a huge difference for the same procedure. What gives?

never heard anyone paying $8k. do a search. lots of threads here on past experiences/costs, etc.

I did it like...........damn prolly almost 4 years ago, did it at the one on Georgia diagonal to shangri-la (name slipped my mind for now), I THINK price was like below 5K, the really cheap ones I think are like financing but I digress. I did the ol school type where they have to cut ur cornea and open it and THEN laser, but there is a no touch type in Vancouver now. Compared to the no touch immediately after procedure everything is super blurry but I've heard that you can drive the night of if you did the no touch one. But yeah its awesome not having to wear glasses, and for me after the procedure I was close to having 20/15 vision (prolly not now), but you still obviously have to take car of ur eyes, I've had a friend that did it a lil earlier than me an hes complaining of not seeing that well.

Hope that helps!

Funny you brought that up. I have an appointment tomorrow about getting it done. I'm planning on doing it at LasikMD in Vancouver. The price is $1000 for both eyes, but it is a 50 Best Canadian Managed companies, and its a lasik chain outlet. I'd suggest PRK over Lasik. Lasik cuts a flap in the eye that can re-open.

So you would suggest PRK even though you are getting Lasik tomorrow?

Here's a video of the process if anyones interested, it's slightly nws

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=O4kDC4sZ5Jg

i had the no-touch correction done over at london eye center about 4-5 years ago...with not many issues to complain about to date. sometimes i see halos/starbursts at night when i'm driving, but it's very minimal.

do your homework and talk to a couple optometrists before you make a decision. you'll probably get more of an educated perspective from them.

also, make sure you invest in a good set of sunglasses (polarized would be a bonus).

i just got mine done about a month ago. i did tons of research before hand and ended up using Dr. Lin at Pacific Laser Eye Centre.

Dr. Lin is the best there is supposedly but you are charged a premium for his services. Other places quoted me $2700, i paid $4100 thru Pacific.

i had prk and i've got no probs at this time. My prescription was over 9.00 in both eyes as well so they were quite bad.

I had my eyes done at the Coal Harbour Laser eye centre. I had some issues and I had to redo them. Right now they are okay, but I will not how they are until I go for my next checkup. My wife and friend had their eyes done at the same place and they have better than 20/20 vision right now and no issues at all. It should cost around $2500 to do

I did mine 2 years ago at London Eye Centre in New west. Cost me $1500 per eye. So $3000 in total. Best money i've ever spent. No problems and very professional. To be honest...i've spent more time in their waiting room than in actual surgery. Surgery itself was about 20 mins. lol.

Sure, you can get it done at some places for $500 per eye. But why would you want to cheap out on your own body? You're not buying a CAI or rims for you car. These are your eyes for the rest of your life. Get it done by the best.

You know the saying....you get what you pay for. :thumbsup:

and out of that 20 mins, 10 mins are spent putting in drops.


+1 for London Eye

When your going through with the surgery, did it hurt at all? Was your eye uncomfortable? Did you have the tendency to blink?

Kinda scared when i think about it, One mistake and there goes your vision..

Has anyone heard of Corneal Refractive Therapy? I've been on it since 2001 in highschool, my friend actually told me about it. . Basically its like braces for your eyes. i actually have 20/15 vision now. its alot cheaper too i think 400-500$ depending how severe your eyesight is.

Theres no cutting, you basically put on a pair of hard contacts at night when you sleep, sleep with them on, take them off in the morning. do that everyday. when you wear them long enough, you can do it every other day. However that depends on how you sleep. if you sleep face down like me then without the contacts your cornea will just get flattened again and you're back at square one. I wear mine every night, the occasional night i forget to put it on, and i don't sleep on my face its fine the next day still. If you forget to wear it like a couple nights (i did a couple times due to lazyness then you'll just have to wear them for a night)

Pros:
- full results in 2 days when you first start (for me atleast)
- you don't feel them when u sleep
- it has never moved into the back of my eyeball once in 7 years (my friends say it will)
- only have to wear it for a couple hours (once your eyes are adjusted to the lens, you only have to wear it for a little while, the amount of sleep you have every night whether its 2 hours or 10 hours won't affect the performance of your eyesight. can't wear it and not sleep though b/c the eyelids act as a "press" to reshape your cornea)

Cons:
- not permanent
- if you travel alot, you'll have to bring them with you
- need to clean the lens everyday and soak them like every other contact
- i've replaced them once in 6 years, i was washing the lens once, and it cracked in half. replacement pair was $300, doctor was amazed it lasted so long, because most people either lose them down the drain, or misplace them.
- irritation if you're not used to it
- in the morning you might get dry eye, and the contact lens is like welded into your cornea. so you need to keep dropping tear drops and rub gently on your eyelids over the edge of the lens to get the tear drops to lubricate inside between ur cornea and lens (thats the most annoying part for me, because its annoying and tedious, if its still dry and u pull it off it'll be very irritated and not good for your cornea) solutions for it = drop a more vicious tear drop into the inside of the lens before inserting in the eye to keep it better lubricated till the morning

if you want more info pm me, i'll refer you to my eye doctor, no problems for 7 years, and i have better vision than most people.

no i'm not promoting for him, i just believe its very underrated. Its cheaper, and it works but some people might not be able to use it though if you have problems with your eyes, my mom for example has problems with her cornea and she could not use it.

info:
http://www.allaboutvision.com/contac...ok.htm#results

I wanna do this too, but they said people with little amounts of degree on their eyes shouldn't bother.

But for me, biggest hassell is in the summer where I can't wear anything BUT perscription sunglasses, or wearing my glasses for long times can give me a headache.

whats the minimum age to get this done?

Coal Harbour's around $2500. Brother and gf had theirs done there. They pre-screen you to see which of the options (PRK/Lasik) are better depending on your eyes and what you do in general. If you're into contact sports, Lasik is not recommended.

best investment the wife and I made. We went to London eye place as well as our friends. Cost $2500 for both eyes for the no touch. I hated having to wear contacts for sports and riding the motorbike.
Book yourself for a consultation. As for age, they can answer that. Can't be too young as your vision is still changing.

I'm currently setting money aside every month for Lasik. I still have 8 months to go before I can get it done. Your eyes are supposed to be free of change for a year before getting it done. I am having bi-monthly eye tests, and so far no prescription change or change in my astigmatism. Can't wait to have good eyes again.

What? I see halos/starbursts ALL the time while night driving and using contact lenses. Is this not supposed to happen? It also happens when going to a movie theatre or watch TV at home in a dim room. I mentioned it to my optometrist and he said it was normal. I have a prescription of about -9.00 in each eye.

I'm planning to get one as well.. but hopefully sometime in the near future.. pretty costly..

nope, defiantly not normal.

go see the doctor that did the sugurey, not your optometrist, he doesn't know anything.

got mine dine at London Place Eye Center in New West.
Went to do my 4th check-up today and I'm right on track!

surgery did not hurt, and recovery time depends on each individual.
i didn't even have to wear sunglasses during those sunny days in november!

had to put in eyedrops every 2 hrs, and all I did was sleep for 2 days straight. they gave you sleeping pills just in case.

i did a search for you, you should read some comments there:
http://www.revscene.net/forums/searc...earchid=595113

someone at my work got laser surgery a few months ago

she is now wearing glasses again....i didn't really want to probe, but she did mention she had a lot of night vision problems and still needs it for farsightedness

I used to see starbursts when i wore my contacts/glasses, and i still do after my surgery.. so it's normal.. no need to worry.
and my eyes were -7.00 and -6.50

it must be stressed that each individual is different, so expect different results.
majority of the patients come out fine.

I did PRK at london eye center a little over a year ago. Best money I have EVER spent! Made me forget that I ever wore glasses at all!! I've worn glasses for about 18 years. My eyes were -4.25. My eyes are now 20/20. Recovery really depends on the person. My eyes were so light sensitive I had to wear sunglasses indoors at night. My vision was pretty blurry for a good week. I couldn't read text on my lcd screen for like 2 weeks. My brother on the other hand, wasn't light sensitive at all, and was back to work in front of his computer the next week all fine. I was told the longer you have worn contacts the longer it will take your eyes to heal. Which kind of makes sense, cause I wore contacts whenever I played sports or went out on the weekend.

With PRK you won't have a scar whereas with laser you will have a permanent scar. If you play sports, PRK is recommended cause with laser you have a good chance it will tear. My sisters co-worker did laser and 6 months later he tore the flap when he rubbed his eye accidentally. Took him an additional 6 months to heal. With PRK the machine does all the work, so research on what company uses what machine. With laser its all up to the surgeon to properly re-align the flap. If the surgeon doesn't do a precise alignment, you will have halo instantaneously. You can avoid halo or have very minimal halo with PRK, but you HAVE to follow the post-op directions very closely.

My night vision is very close to when I used to wear contacts. I don't get halo, but streetlamps are starbust to me. Highbeams do sting a bit and I think my eyes are kind of sensitive to flash camera in the dark. I kind of figure the "flash" sensitivity just recently cause one of my friends made fun of how I close my eyes in every single picture. Hope this helps.:)