Development of Cataract Surgery
Lens is an integral part of the human eye. Natural lensesare clear and their function is to focus the light in the retina of the eye. Also,lenses can absorb potentially harmful wavelengths of light, protecting the eye.Aging brings changes to whole organism, including the eyes. In older people,lenses may become yellow because of the years of protective absorption of lightand additionally, because of the oxidative stress that has been accumulating overthe years.
Cataract surgery is specifically designed to help people andimprove their vision, fixing the problem with cloudy lens (or both eye lenses).
Older cataract surgery techniques involved complete removalof the cloudy lens from the patient’s eye. After that, patients were requiredto wear contact lenses or extremely thick glasses to be able to see anything happeningaround them.
Advancement of the technology brought development of theanterior chamber intraocular lenses (sometimes shortened as IOL). When doctorsremove the clouded natural lens, they were able to place this artificial lenson its place, in front of the iris. The downfall of this method was the damageto the cornea of the eye, resulting in swelling of this part of the eye andalso in cloudy vision. Vibration caused by the artificial lenses were causingthese problems, so scientists and eye surgeons developed posterior chamberIOLs. Now, these lenses were placed behind the iris, there were no vibrationsinvolved and the cornea was not suffering from any damage. Even these posteriorchamber lenses were further improved, getting smaller, more flexible and ofbetter quality. All these surgeries were still able to achieve only distance correction,and patients needed their reading glasses to see people and objects in thevicinity.
New IOL Implants
Multi-focal implant lenses are the newest addition to cataractsurgery. There are several different lenses available at the market, including:Restore, Rezoom, Tecnis and Crystalens, and of these lenses can provide fullrange of vision after the cataract surgery. The choice which implant issuitable for which patient depends on the need for bilateral surgeries, onpatients’ expectations and side effects, and this is something you need todiscuss with qualified and experienced surgeon. Cost of this surgery is alsoone of the contributing factors, because insurance doesn’t pay for this and patientsmight need a lot of money in order to have this surgery. In fact, surgicalprocedure like this one may cost you about 2.000 US $ for one eye only.
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