3 months
So Monday marks my 3 month since my surgery and although my 3 month check-up is not scheduled until the 4 month mark, I thought I'd give a quick update.
Vision is great. I couldn't be happier being glasses free with 20/20 vision (both eyes together). The tattoo however, didn't really work. I still see the white line glare in super bright situations as previously described before. I can't tell if it's slightly more faded or not. It really doesn't bother me that much though as it is very, very faint and appears in less than 5-10% of my day. I have to lift my lids to an unnatural state in order to see them. But I do notice them, especially in our age of smartphones: we're always looking down at our phones and glancing up to make sure we don't run into people. It is that moment of glancing up without moving your head that forces your lids above the iridotomy holes. That's where the glare comes in. I plan on asking my doctor at the 4 month point what happened and if anything else can be done... if not, I have to say that I'm going to give a big shrug and move on with my life. I'm still super happy about the ICLs!
Summer has arrived and I can't wait to dive into my condo pool: no glasses or contacts to worry about. No sweaty, greasy glasses to push up while out and about in the city. That's after my big trip to Asia & Europe - sans contact solution, cases or spare glasses! Woot!
I also have my regular annual optometrist appointment next week. It'll be my first with my ICLs/ without glasses. This should be interesting. I'll try to blog about it after. Be well and I will try to keep answering your questions. Cheers!
Vision is great. I couldn't be happier being glasses free with 20/20 vision (both eyes together). The tattoo however, didn't really work. I still see the white line glare in super bright situations as previously described before. I can't tell if it's slightly more faded or not. It really doesn't bother me that much though as it is very, very faint and appears in less than 5-10% of my day. I have to lift my lids to an unnatural state in order to see them. But I do notice them, especially in our age of smartphones: we're always looking down at our phones and glancing up to make sure we don't run into people. It is that moment of glancing up without moving your head that forces your lids above the iridotomy holes. That's where the glare comes in. I plan on asking my doctor at the 4 month point what happened and if anything else can be done... if not, I have to say that I'm going to give a big shrug and move on with my life. I'm still super happy about the ICLs!
Summer has arrived and I can't wait to dive into my condo pool: no glasses or contacts to worry about. No sweaty, greasy glasses to push up while out and about in the city. That's after my big trip to Asia & Europe - sans contact solution, cases or spare glasses! Woot!
I also have my regular annual optometrist appointment next week. It'll be my first with my ICLs/ without glasses. This should be interesting. I'll try to blog about it after. Be well and I will try to keep answering your questions. Cheers!
Hi,
ReplyDeleteThank you for the informative blog. I have -8 D and -8.5 D in my right and left eye and -4 D and -4.5 D cylindrical power.
After reading your blog, i have quite decided not to go for the conventional ICL with iridotomy. Am from India and the new Visian V4C ICL is available in select eye hospitals here as they order it from Switzerland.
But am told with high astigmatism as mine, it would be quite difficult to get the toric lens with the holes though am still consulting multiple hospitals.
I would like to hear from you, if you would suggest, is it worth taking the risk of getting a iridotomy done or better to wait till there is a better alternative available where they dont perform the iridotomy.
Regards,
Vikranth
Hi Vikranth: that's great that V4C is available for you. As I noted in my very first post in this blog, I saw that it is available in several countries. Unfortunately, it is not available in Canada - and these things take ages to get approved by government bodies - I wasn't willing to wait. The other concern I had was that V4C is untested technology: it is so new that there isn't a significant amount of data out there on its effectiveness. One may need to get iridotomies anyway should one acquire narrow angle glaucoma (an ICL risk). Conventional ICLs pre-empt that.
ReplyDeleteYou should definitely look into the Toric V4C option as I have read some not-so-good stories about those - particularly in the US when/where conventional toric ICLs aren't even approved by the FDA - who had poor visual outcomes and had to get LASIK/PRK on top of their ICLs in order to fix the astigmatism that the non-toric ICLs failed to correct. It's an important consideration - I have bad astigmatism too, but my toric ICLs are great.
I can't suggest that you should do one or the other. I think the new V4C ICLs sound amazing - but just be cautious around its new-ness and lack of research on the results (would that hole ever be blocked? can you still get an iridotomy and not damage the V4C ICL if you acquire narrow angle glaucoma in the future?). Most of all, I would be really concerned that the astigmatism isn't corrected unless you can get a toric lens. I think the risk and impact of the glare side effect (again barely impacts my day and sounds way worse than it actually is) is something to weigh against blurry vision that doesn't correct astigmatism and may require LASIK or PRK on top (another round of surgery)....
So it's really up to you. I'm not a doctor, so keep researching and let me know what you decide. If you go for the V4Cs, I would be curious to hear about your results. Cheers!
Hi ICLer,
ReplyDeleteI've found your blog while searching for information about corneal tattoo. I underwent laser iridotomy myself and got this infamous "white line glare" as a unwanted bonus ;) I find it really annoying even though surgery was done 1.5 years ago. There are several reports that corneal tattooing is helpful in such cases and I was fairly decided to travel abroad to have it done (it is not available in Poland), but your story raised some questions. Could you please describe how your tattos look like ? Do you have any suspicions why they do not block the white line from appearing ?
Regards
Jack
hi jack. thanks for your message. I don't know why well, I guess I do) doctors minimize this risk, when most people I talk to get the line. It makes sense: there's a hole, so light will enter unless your eye lids naturally sit lower in a relaxed, normal state. I'm sorry to hear that you find it really annoying. I definitely see why. My eye lids sit low, so I only experience the effect at rare times in a day so I would have been fine not getting the tattoos.
ReplyDeleteI have heard that the corneal tattoos are a rare procedure that only a handful of doctors can do. I'm glad you found one. I think it's worth a try -- I unfortunately do not know why mine haven't really worked. My next follow-up is in June so I will be asking and will report back! At this point, I think my doctor thinks he's solved the issue for me as I haven't said anything yet (wanted to see if it would get better over time). I still honestly can't tell if it's slightly better - it might be? But the fact that I can still see a glare - whether more faded than before or not - is a sign that even a corneal tattoo may not work 100%. I suspected that maybe the ink faded out already, but I had a regular optometrist appointment last week and she said the ink was definitely there (but she hadn't see anything like it before in her career). I'll let you know after my next appointment.