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February 26, 2007
Today’s refractive surgery trends :Preferred surgeries
Eyeworld Feb 2007
Ninety-four percent of surgeons said that they perform LASIK and/or PRK,... “We don’t have many people saying they do only LASIK or only PRK,” Seventy-one percent said they perform limbal relaxing incisions (LRIs) with IOLs, and 57% said they perform refractive lens exchange (RLE); that same percentage of surgeons uses LRIs alone. A smaller number of surgeons perform conductive keratoplasty (CK), LASEK, Epi-LASIK, and insert phakic IOLs—each procedure being performed by 20% to 30% of respondents.
The trend toward less LASIK and increased phakic–IOL use was shown in hypothetical treatment scenarios for certain patients. For example, in a 30-year-old, –10 D or –12 D myope, most surgeons in the earlier years of the survey would have performed LASIK. However, in 2006, only 31% said they would perform LASIK. Thirty-five percent said they would use a phakic IOL, and 15% said they would wait and not perform any immediate surgery.
For a 45-year-old, +5 D hyperope, the percentage of surgeons who would have performed LASIK has declined from just over 30% in 1999 to only 8% in the last year. The number one choice was RLE, preferred by 61% of surgeons, followed by those who waited (23%).
Overall, surgeons said they will continue to perform LASIK and PRK in the future, although many plan to increase use of LRIs, RLEs, and phakic IOLs. Despite earlier predictions of increased laser thermokeratoplasty (LTK) from the 2000 survey, increased frequency of LTK’s has not occurred.In addition, a growing number of respondents—nearly one-third—reported that they have had refractive surgery performed on themselves.
Posted by mehdi khanlari at February 26, 2007 10:55 PM