Expert: Dr Anand Shroff, MD, FICS - 3/24/2007

Question
Hello,
My name is Morgan Wells, I live in Orange County, ny and I am a 21 year old student.
My mother recently went for LASIK eye surgery (the customized one where you end up with no flap) on March 13th. It is now Saturday, March 24th.

Since the surgery date my mother has been back to her doctor several times.
She said that after the surgery she could see amazing in the office.. but then her vision worsened. During the days immediately after the surgery she complained of extreme pain, like razorblades in her eyes. She was wearing protective contact lenses in her eyes and insisted that they be taken out. She went to her doctor and she got his assistant who refused to remove them. The next day she was able to get her actual doctor who then removed them. She had extreme pain before the removal and her eyes were extremely swollen.
When she was younger she had a corneal abrasion due to a toxic reaction she had from her contact lenses. She is now 47 and that was some time ago, however, ever since she was younger she has not been able to even wear contact lenses and had been wearing glasses for years.

Over the past week and a half the pain has gone away. She is on Pred Forte, Xibron and some other drops. Shes gone back to the doctor several times. She cannot drive. She cannot read, watch tv, etc. She cannot return to work and is worried.

Today we went to see her doctor and he just told her shes taking longer to heal. He keeps telling her shes taking longer to heal. I dont trust her doctor.. and I think she's even lost her trust in him. Immediately after seeing him today, and him telling her NOTHING! basically, we went to get her some eye glasses from a place at a mall. When the eye doctor of the place saw her eyes and had her read the charts, he said that she still had unhealed corneal abrasions and that he would not be able to give her glasses. He also told us to see a corneal specialist as soon as possible!
The way he acted, was basically that she need to seek help asap.. and that he told her not to tell any one he told her that.

So I rushed my mom to the Westchester, NY Emergency Medical Center. She wasnt in pain and I dont know if it was necessarily an emergency but im very worried about her. Ive been reading different "gone wrong" stories on the internet and many of the gone wrong stories sound like what shes going through.
The doctors at the hospital acted like they were bothered that they had to see her.
Shes a tough lady and so am I .. we don't usually overreact. But I feel like everywhere we go we're getting the run around.
I want to act asap to help her because the longer we wait, the worse it could get.

She cant see much of any thing.
On the way home from the hospital she said that the road looked like a giant light show.
When the eye doctor had seen her earlier he had said that her eyes were cloudy as if she was looking through a foggy window.

Im writing to you, to see if I am overreacting or to get any advice or ANYTHING.
I dont know what to do. I don't trust the doctors. I just want my mom to get her life back so bad. It's like shes been robbed of every right and shes totally helpless.

If you recognize what she may have and you could let me know that would help.
If you could recommend any doctors I would appreciate that as well.
We live in NY about an hour from manhattan. I am willing to take her wherever I have to.
Also, should she continue to go to this doctor that did the surgery..
I read some stories that people who did that ended up getting even more surgery that made their vision worse.

If you could please get back to me asap I would appreciate it.
Please help.
Thank you.


Answer
Dear Morgan,

Firstly, I am sorry that your mother and you have to go through this painful experience. Yes, reading horror stories (and there are enough on the internet) can really give someone sleepless nights.
With LASIK, there is a lot of confusion with new technology and a variety of marketing terms being used by various doctors. The customized LASIK does not necessarily mean that it was bladeless. The customized part refers to only the laser part of the treatment. However, with many new  doctors jumping on the LASIK Bandwagon, amongst other reasons as well, LASIK procedures can have 'flap complications', hence arose the need for bladeless LASIK. But this only does the mechanical part of creating a flap with no blades usually termed 'Intralase'.
The only bladeless method is EpiLASIK, can also be customized depending on the laser treatment. Now, if your mother has undergone EpiLASIK, then yes, it is painful, takes longer to heal since this primarily works on the outer most surface of the eye called Epithelium. Here, one has a lot of watering of the eyes, sensitivity to light and pain (depending from person to person with their individual threshold).
If the epithelium for some reason has not healed in 4 days (the time that bandage contact lenses are put), then it does take longer sometimes upto 10 days.

If there is still severe pain and you have not undergone EpiLASIK, and also since your mother had history of corneal abrasions, these corneal abrasions are very painful and must be treated immediately taking it as an emergency. Your optometrist is right that your mother must see a corneal surgeon in her best interest.
This is only to be safer than sorry!
Let me know her progress.
Hope this information helped,

Dr Anand Shroff, MS (OPHTH), FICS
www.lasikindia.in