My New Eyes (Patrick Post)

I am writing this blog post with pretty limited/blurry vision of the computer screen, please excuse any typos.

I recently had PRK (photo-refractive keratotony) surgery on both of my eyes. PRK is a laser eye surgery that is similar to Lasik in that it is also a laser corrective eye surgery. With Lasik, the surgeon will cut a flap in your cornea to correct your vision, whereas with PRK he/she simply does some “surface molding” to your cornea with the laser. So from a surgical standpoint, it is a much less invasive (ie much safer) procedure. The downside of PRK is that it is a more painful procedure with a longer recovery.

I began wearing glasses in the seventh grade when I could no longer see the chalkboard or overhead projector at school. I never liked wearing glasses, but the confluence of my vision becaming worse and turning sixteen and getting my driver’s license, I needed to have corrective lenses at all times. So from the age of sixteen until now, I have worn contact lenses.

Tired of spending a couple hundred dollars everytime I needed a new set of contacts and constantly having to update my prescriptions, I was pretty motivated to get Lasik surgery if I ever had extra money. Admittedly, I knew pretty minimal details about the surgery, other than it is a quick process and you have 20/20 vision by the day after your surgery. I entered this process with the intent of having Lasik, but on my consultation with my surgeon, Dr. McCall of Cornea Associates (www.corneatexas.com), he highly recommended PRK instead of Lasik because of pretty major astigmatisms in both of my eyes.

I have known about the astigmatisms in my eyes for quite some time. How the astigmatism primarily affected me was that my night vision has always been pretty sensitive; car and traffic lights would typically appear to have a halo of light around them.

With Lasik surgery, most people will tell you they wake up the next day and have 20/20 vision with little to no side effects. Unfortunately for me, PRK has been a much more tedious process in regaining my vision. It has almost been two weeks since my surgery and my vision continues to be two steps forward, one and half steps back. I am continuing to put preservative-free lubricant drops in my eyes about six hundred times a day, as the surgery has left them very dry. I usually start out each day pretty strong, and my vision gets progressively worse as the day goes on and my eyes get more and more dry.

The recovery process is expected to typically take about 30 days to have full vision. From my post-op appointments with Dr. McCall and my follow-up appointments with my optometrist, Dr. Garza at Dallas Eye Care (www.dallaseyecare.com), everything is going as expected, if not ahead of schedule. The doctors have estimated that I will have better than 20/20 vision at the end of the recovery.

As I said to Jennifer the other night, there is never really an ideal time to not be able to see, so it’s been pretty frustrating with my vision going in and out for the last couple weeks. Ask me how I’m feeling in another 2.5 weeks. My hope is that this will be a distant memory once I have full vision at the end of this recovery.

If anyone has any questions or has considered having laser eye surgery, feel free to email or call me with any questions on the process.