Considering LASIK Surgery
Michalis 'BIG Mike' Kotzakolios


Defined Tag: Lasik Surgery.

Chances are that you have not only heard of LASIK surgery, but that someone you know has had it performed on them. The purpose of this article is simply to familiarize you with some of the most basic terminology and concepts regarding this exciting field of surgery.

First, let's clear up a few facts. While it is true that LASIK surgery is generally a quick procedure (taking as little as one minute per eye), this is not always the case. In some circumstances, the operation can take upwards of half an hour per eye. The time variances, as with most things, are dependant entirely upon the individual case and the specific form of LASIK surgery being performed.

Furthermore, though it's not treated with as much respect and awe as other forms of surgery, it truly is surgery -and on the eyes no less, and so having any ocular procedure performed should not be taken flippantly and with little thought. This is not to say that you should bring fear with you to the optician's office, only a level head.

LASIK surgery involves the cleaning of the cornea, the outermost section of the eye which conducts the vast majority of the eye's refractive abilities. While this part of the eye is only a miniscule .5 millimeters thick, it is composed of 5 separate layers. In order they are the epithelium, Bowman's membrane, the stroma, Descernet's membrane, and the endothelium.

Of these five layers, the two most discussed (and cut) are the epithelium and the stroma. Depending upon your individual problem and which form of LASIK surgery both you and your eye surgeon agree is best for you depends upon how deeply into each of these layers the surgeon will cut.

The purpose of cutting into these layers is to ablate -that is, remove unnecessary tissue that has accrued within or under the cornea. Such tissue matter and phenomena include the non-technical "bumps," "fissures," "thickening of tissue" and "wrinkles" which accrue over time. This matter affects the cornea by forcing it to change shape -thus resulting in the 3 most common forms of eye problems: near-sightedness, far-sightedness, and astigmatisms.

While these first 2 problems are self-evident in meaning, astigmatisms are a little less understood. Simply put, astigmatisms result in diminished refraction (by not conducting light entering the eye in a proper way) due to a misshapen cornea, thus producing haloes, starring, and similar conditions in sight.

When performing LASIK surgery the surgeon will hone in on the ablation zone -the area from which this tissue must be removed, and with a laser will induce ablation -actually vaporizing excess tissue out of the cornea. This is generally performed using a broad beam laser. This instrument creates a highly-focused light beam which is relatively broad in width (6.0 to 8.0 millimeters), and so is able to work close up to the cornea for ablation purposes.

The goal, of course, is improved sight. While the results of such surgery are often deemed "miraculous" it should be remembered that complications and imperfect sight may still result, as too may the continual need for reading glasses, especially for those over forty years of age, so do as much research as tolerable before jumping beneath the laser beam, and good luck.

BIG Mike is a well known author, developer and Adsense expert as well as the owner of Niche Maniacs - a unique Adsense Marketing System designed to build long-term passive income streams from Adsense, YPN, Chitika and other PPC services.