Does LASIK Cause Night Vision to Change?
I’m almost convinced that I should go through with LASIK but I’m quite concerned about changes to my night vision, such as glare and halos. How often does this side effect occur and what can be done to prevent it?
When LASIK was performed in it’s early years with first generation lasers there was a high incidence of night vision problems, noticeably among patients with a larger pupil diameter. Night vision was an issue because older generation lasers only allowed for an average size pupil zone of 6mm to 8mm diameter. When a pupil is measured in dim light it will dilate to allow more light to come in. That is why when considering pupil size in the practice of LASIK, a pupil is considered to be large if the dim light pupil diameter exceeds the diameter of the lasers optical zone. Patients with large pupils and high amounts of nearsightedness, astigmatism or farsightedness were at greater risk using lasers that had a smaller pupil diameter treatment zone. Today experienced laser vision correction surgeons have more understanding of how to reshape cornea and avoid this problem by using the latest technology which is Intralase Femtosecond laser to create the corneal flap and prolate optimized or wavefront optimized custom treatments.
Prolate and Wavefront-guided lasers have now established that for the vast majority of patients with large pupils and high amounts of nearsightedness, astigmatism or farsightedness can now effectively be treated without causing problems with night vision. Dr. Holzman performs LASIK on US Navy and Air Force fighter pilots who strongly believe in this technology and have the visual outcomes to prove it. There is a great advantage in having the Intralase Femto-second laser to customize the diameter of the flap and both Allegretto Wavelight and the VISX star 4 lasers all in the same surgical suite! It allows Dr. Holzman to pick the best laser that suites your vision needs. One size does not fit all!
