If you ask me whether I was nervous on the day of my iLASIK surgery, I can tell you I wasn’t.
Not because I was pretending to be fearless.
Not because of the half a tablet of Valium they gave me. (Never taken Valium before. It’s supposed to calm me down.)
In fact, it was work which took my mind off the surgery. I was rushing some last minute stuff for a client that Monday morning so I really didn’t have time to even think about iLASIK! (A tip if you are ever going for any elective surgery – do something else so you won’t sit around twiddling your thumbs and worry!)
I was scheduled for my elective eye surgery on Monday afternoon about 2.30pm but I had to be there an hour earlier to do some final eye check-up, settle my surgery bill (yes, that is very important – it costs RM2988 per eye) and get briefed and sign an agreement. Even though we are their website design firm, I still paid my bill because let’s face it, business is business.
It is an elective surgery so the agreement was a must. I had to understand that I didn’t HAVE TO undergo iLASIK; there were other options available to me – glasses, contact lenses etc. I understood what iLASIK was about and chose to do it. And then I signed the agreement. Immediately after, I was given half a tablet of Valium and 2 Paracetamol to gulp down. It was supposed to keep me away from pre-surgery jitters.
As I mentioned before, there are 2 parts to the iLASIK procedure. Both parts are done using laser.
Going Into Surgery
For the first part, I was brought to a smaller room where I was asked to lie down. The nurse from Sabah (I’ve forgotten her name now) was chatty enough. She talked as she worked. First she disinfects my eyes and places ice-cold packs on my eyes to numb them.
She lets me hug a pillow and covers me with a thick blanket so I look like a beached whale on the chair (like the type dentists use so you are horizontal!). After 5 minutes or so, she puts some eye drops into my eyes (which could be the anesthetic methinks). I am still awake. I hear her chatting away. She tells me that she’ll talk me through the procedure but I don’t have to answer or nod.
At this point, Dr Tah takes over. The endearing part of this is hearing Dr Tah say that he’ll say a prayer for me. Adventist is a Christian hospital so they start surgery with a prayer. I find that so sweet and endearing! Suddenly Dr Tah and his nurses don’t seem so unfamiliar. If a person can say a prayer for you, it grows a bond between strangers which humanizes the business transaction. No matter who we are, we still look to the Divine for guidance, strength and assistance.
After the short prayer, Dr Tah asks me to look at the red light in front of my eye. He and his team work on each eye individually, covering one eye up with a cotton gauze. I believe they also put a retainer over my eye so I would not blink. I didn’t feel pain; just mild pressure on my eye ball. At this point, Dr Tah was using the computer-guided IntraLase Femtosecond laser to create the corneal flap for each eye. Creating these flaps take mere seconds. And really, I didn’t feel a thing. The good thing was, I was awake throughout the procedure and the nurses told me what was going on every step of the way. This greatly reduces anxiety even though I was thinking, hey I should be worrying, why am I not worried?
When it was over, I got up but everything was blurry. Like someone misted the whole room. The nurse held me as I was guided to the surgery room (a few steps away) where I was again asked to lie down. Again, she gave me a pillow to hug and pulled a warm blanket over me. (The surgery room is cold.)
This was the actual part where Dr Tah would fold aside the corneal flaps and use a computer-driven excimer laser or cold laser to correct my short-sightedness and astigmatism by re-shaping my corneas.
For this second step, the nurse covered up my left eye. Dr Tah was going to work on my right eye first. My right eye has less severe short-sightedness so the laser time for this eye was much shorter – I think it was 20 seconds.
My corneal flap was lifted aside. When Dr Tah did this, I was momentarily blinded.
Once the flap is lifted and pushed aside (imagine opening up a can of sardines. You use the can opener to go all around the top of the tin but not to the point of breaking the circle. Then you use a fork to push aside the top of the can so yeah, this is as close to what I can describe about the flap!), I again can see the red light above me and heard this mechanical tick-tick-tick sound. I was indescribably calm. Maybe the Valium was taking effect!
Angine the nurse again walked me through the procedure calmly and confidently. The laser will be re-shaping my right cornea. She tells me that it will take 20 seconds and that I’m doing fine and that I’ve reached the halfway mark of 10 seconds and soon it will be over. Once the laser stops, I smell a faint burnt smell which is most likely the smell of laser on my cornea! It’s like the smell of burnt hair. Dr Tah then gently puts back the corneal flap, smoothing it out.
They then cover my right eye and work on my left eye. This left eye of mine has more severe short-sightedness plus a good dose of astigmatism so it takes 34 seconds to laser the cornea. Finally the corneal flap is placed back and smoothed out.
(Did you know that your friends and family can view your surgery as it happens? It’s scarier for the people viewing the surgery than for the one undergoing it. You can also request from AVC to view the surgery just to put your fears to rest that it is fast and pain-less.)
And in less than 20 minutes, it’s over! I was ready to go home by 3.30pm!
When I get up from my horizontal position, the first thing I am asked to look at is the wall clock. While my vision was still blurry, I could actually read the numbers on the clock!
The nurse then led me out of the surgery room and put eye drops in each eye before taping plastic eye shields over my eyes.
She gave me 2 different types of eye drops to use 4 times a day (Pred Forte and Zymar), to be followed by Refresh Plus eye lubricants for the next 7 days. And also paracetamol just in case.
I was also told to go home and sleep for 3 hours with the eye shields on. I was instructed to wear the eye shields at night while sleeping for the next 3 days. I looked like Ultraman with the shields on!
I was scheduled to come in the next day to check my eyes. Then, a follow-up check a week later. The third checkup will be in a month’s time.
When I woke up from my 3-hour nap, I could see clearly!
And yes, I could drive and work immediately the next day though I had to go out with sunglasses (glare isn’t so good for eyes just operated on).
My 3rd check-up will be at the end of this month. So far, I’ve felt so blessed to be able to enjoy clarity after years of wearing glasses. It was a bit sentimental when I threw out my last pair of contact lenses soaking in saline. I emptied out the saline bottle. I packed up my glasses, keeping them as a memento.
Advice and Some Final Two Cents
This is an elective surgery. You choose to do it or you can choose not to. It won’t kill you to wear glasses either. It’s really up to you. If you always felt you could do better without glasses or contacts, then perhaps iLASIK is for you.
I also understand many people may be fearful of going blind (yikes) or having complications. That is why you must do your research first and get to know the facts. You must talk to people who have done it. You must go to a reputable service provider. I was like that initially. I was really scared and worried but the more you know, the less afraid you become.
And please, price should be your last concern. I know people who told me that I could get it cheaply done for less than RM4K but hell, these are my eyes!
You may not even be going to Adventist Vision Centre and this is certainly NOT a post telling you to do it there. I am telling you how the experience feels like, what I know and what I have done. But try to get the iLASIK procedure where available as it is used by the US Army and NASA astronauts. iLASIK is also about Custom Wavefront 3D mapping of the eyes where it creates a personalised treatment for your eyes.
I am presently quite happy with my 20/20 vision. I use the Refresh Plus eye drops whenever I feel my eyes getting dry (especially in air-cond areas or when I wake up in the morning). I see halos around lights at night (which I am told, will lessen over time). I need to be careful while washing my face in the first few days and I am advised not to rub my eyes.
Have healthy expectations regarding your vision.
You won’t have supersonic eyesight but you will be able to see clearly.
And you can finally throw away your glasses!
ilasik
Seeing Through Holes
Eyes.
Can’t see without them. 90% of what we get from the world we get through our eyesight.
When I was at St Nicholas Home for the Blind recently, I was truly grateful for my vision though I wear contact lenses. It’s like, sure, I don’t have perfect vision but these children are blind. Some of them don’t even know what a rainbow looks like.
Actually right about this time, we’re also involved with a new website development project for a new client from The Adventist Hospital. Coincidentally, this division deals with laser eye correction surgery or what we all know as LASIK.
As we’re also involved in producing copy for the website, I’ve been researching about laser eye surgeries from PRK to LASEK and then to the newest technology called iLASIK. I’ve read so much about the pros and cons of these vision correction surgeries that it’s eye-popping (pardon the pun).
I’ve had friends who have had this corrective eye surgery done and they’ve been raving over the results. Finally they say, they can see without glasses and what a change in lifestyle it has been!
I’ve been so tempted to try this laser surgery myself but I’ve still got so many pairs of disposable contact lenses. I would need to wait till my stock is finished.
But then Nic, who is all about natural healing, tells me to try the Bates Method. Apparently, your eyes can heal themselves. The issue is, they can’t heal if all we ever wear are glasses and contact lenses (which are like crutches for your eyes). Bates is the name of the man who popularised this method of training the eyes to heal by wearing pinhole glasses.
So Nic decided last week that he wanted to try the natural way of bringing back his 20/20 vision. He got out and bought the Bates pinhole glasses. They’re not cheap. A pair of this costs RM78. It’s just a pair of dark glasses, much like your plastic sunglasses, but with pinholes scattered on the area where the lens are.
I was a bit of a skeptic but I tried them on anyway (had to remove my contact lenses first). I could actually read the words on some books about 3 feet away!
I have shortsightedness and since 11, have been wearing glasses till I found contact lenses when I was 19. Although my prescription has stabilized at 4.5 diopter and I can use contact lenses now (and I don’t have dry eye problems unlike most lens users), I still want good vision. Vision without spectacles. I’ve done a lot of stuff wearing contacts lenses such as swimming and other outdoor activities but I still wished I didn’t have shortsightedness.
Back to the Bates glasses.
The idea is to train your eyes to heal themselves naturally. I’m supposed to wear the glasses while watching TV or reading.
The first time I wore them, it was a bit annoying. My eyes have to get accustomed to the pinholes. I have to focus correctly otherwise I will see overlapping images. Once I get the correct focus, I can actually see well! I can watch TV clearly and read the subtitles without squinting. I can see most objects clearly without problems.
The only thing I didn’t like was reading with the Bates spectacles. As I am shortsighted, I usually don’t read with my normal glasses on. I usually take the glasses off when I look at near objects like books. If I read with the Bates spectacles, it is also irritating. Maybe it works for people who have longsightedness.
I can’t bear to wear them when I work on the PC because it’s just too weird for close objects. For me it works best on objects about 3 feet or more away. Anything nearer and it makes me giddy looking at double images!
Accordingly, it is best to wear and ‘train’ one’s eyes for a few hours a day. This way, our eyes can adjust and correct themselves. I should be seeing an improvement in my eyesight after 2-3 weeks of using them.
Let’s see what happens over the next few weeks or whether I need LASIK surgery after all!