Ultralase

It is now 3 months since my Lasek procedure at Ultralase, Hammersmith. Bearing in mind that my combined short sight/astigmatism totalled about 10 in each eye, I consider that the results achieved are good. I am wary of driving at night as I seem to see less in lower light. I can use my PC properly, but I have to sit quite close to the TV to read sub-titles, credits etc. On the whole, my vision is slightly hazy but I am told that this should clear up soon, but not overnight! Monovision takes a lot of getting used to and I may have to consider a "reading" lens for my right "non-reading" eye so that I can watch TV etc. in greater comfort. I have a further check up after Easter and will keep you posted.

Had the surgery 4 weeks ago now, very pleased with the results, was -2.5 and -3, could not read the top letter on the chart before and now I can read the second line from the bottom, it is expensive, but worth it, and it is so nice not to wear contacts or glasses anymore, Most painful part- when they pull off the protective sticky sheet they put on your face- blimey thought I was having a face wax!! The op was painless. Worst part- Not being allowed to wear make-up for 2 weeks (or being allowed to brush my horse due to the dust and hair) Jenny

I had Lasek on my left eye in June 2003 at Birmingham. The vision is OK but the eye feels very dry. Since December 2003 the problem has gone from bad to worse. I have to go back to the clinic every 4 weeks. Each visit I was given some eyedrops to be administed every hour. These don't really help and I am walking around with a permanent pink/red eye. Occasionally I get severe bloodshot that I am embarrassed to look at people in the eye and have to wear sunglasses - even in the rain. To be honest if I had known this was going to happen,I would not have the treatment and spend the money on a nice holiday. At least I would not have to endure these symptoms not to mention the inconvenience of having to put eyedrops in every hour and visiting the clinic every 4 weeks. Do your research carefully before you consider treatment. Don't forget these messages here are selective i.e. the clinics can insist on the website to remove negative feedbacks.

Ultralase - Manchester Unfortunately I have not got any further than the consultation process... Clinc nice, clean and modern looking, spoke and had tests with an Advisor and then progressed onto the optician. She carried out more tests and suspected I had thin corneas - however not to rule out treatment completely we discussed tissue saving etc and she needed to speak to the surgeon who wasn't around until the following week and she'd discuss my case with him and either call me back in to see him in person or let me know the outcome by phone. Unfortunately that's where the trouble lies - it's been nearly 2 weeks now and still nothing.... In the meantime I went to Boots in Manchester and had another consultation with them where they dealt with me in full there and then. Unfortunately it turns out I'm not a good candidate (Thanks mum for the completely divey eyes!) Good luck to all considering or having treatment - it looks like I have to find a lot more money for Implantable Lenses or carry on with the specs....

As a marine engineer, a good standard of eyesight is important particularly for machinery inspections. 4 months have gone by since my treatment and it is still no where near what I expected. It is worse now than with glasses. I am disappointed and frustrated with my abysmally variable eyesight. I personally would not recommend the treatment. Think very very carefully.

From the assessment day (Bristol Clinic) I have been less than pleased with ultralase. I saw different staff each time i have been there and felt very pressured into making an appointment for WAVEFRONT. As there were not DISadvtages of having wavefront, and i don't care about the money when it comes to your eyes, I decided to book in for 2 months time for Thurs 27th may. I was then told they would have to write to me re an appoiment cos of some problem. I was sent an appoinment for 27th, but no aftercare app was made - it was left to me to organise that, and payment was demanded 2m prior to the event, which would cost 50 quid in interest alone. obviously I did not pay it. on Mon 24th i receive a phone call "So you;re booked in for Lasik right?" I explained it was wavefront, i even signed a form withit on and everything, but they had stuffed up and could not perform the op anytime this week. I was so upset, this is the ONLY time i can possibly have it done, so he said i could go to B'ham, just what i wanted to do before/after a stressful op. No discount was offered and an apology was only offered when i told him how disapointed i was. Then it is revealed i actually need to go 3wks before hand for some more tests, which i was not told about. Since nothing could be done I phoned Boots and had Lasik done - they informed me that actually they could increase the width of the laser beam to cover my large pupils so I wouldn't be any more 2at risk" of night glare than anyone else (the reason i went for wavefront in the first place). So Now i can see thanks to Boots - they were fantastic, and didn't make me doubt them once unlike ultralase. I'm sure their surgeons are fine, but their admin staff did not fill me with confidence.

I went for an initial consultation at the Guildford clinic to see if I was suitable for Wavefront. Well first off I met with what I have to describe as a friendly person who did my prescription but inherently didn’t come across as very professional. My fears where later proved correct when he put drops in my eyes to test me on the wavefront machine (the one with the white/black round circles) only to find the room that this machine was in was occupied. I waited for half an hour which meant the eye drops where not effective when I was tested finally on the machine. The advisor said I should come in for a retest in 3 weeks time, there next available slot! To make things worse I then talked to the nurse councillor who goes through the prices with you only to find her contradicting information compared to what I have been told by the previous gentlemen, and that he only comes in once a week for a few hours! All this boast about there staff being full time committed to only Ultralase is a little thin after this. In all they need to have a better management system there, the room being occupied when it was my turn was simply unacceptable! Eventually I went to Optical Express which did an excellent consultation, went through the procedures in much more detail and more importently went through the risks in depth; they came across as more honest and professional. There machine stated that I can have wavefront and I am indeed going to go with them at Shaftsbury Avenue (London). I keep you updated on the results. P.S I don’t know why this website promotes the Zyoptix (Ultralase) machine so much, the VISX 4 machine (which optical express has) in clinical trials has a higher percentage of people obtaining 20/20 vision then the Zyoptix (96% vs 91%), and as far as I can see less complications? Look at the official FDA report on the VISX 4 at http://www.fda.gov/cdrh/pdf/p930016S016a.pdf Especially look at pages 2-3 which go through complications, and the latest Zyoptix lazer at http://www.fda.gov/cdrh/pdf/P990027S006a.pdf Again look at pages 2-3. You decide?

I visited this clinic and was initially very keen to go along and get my eyes treated, especially in light of my brother having had PRK 10 years ago with the obvious side effects of having this done in the early days. LCRS are keen to enhance fears of laser surgery and base their opinion on PRK treatments of 10 years ago and all the horror stories ensuing this early treatment. They do not tend to answer questions as directly as I would have liked and based their dislike of laser on a small internal sample of patients that they had treated a long time ago - surely this must have been PRK patients as I don't believe they ever went in for Lasik. I found it hard to research RK (which is what their "microsurgery" is) as it is not really performed any longer globally. There is a good reason for this, as I found: For LCRS treatment go to HYPERLINK http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed/ and search "PERK AND cornea" which will give you the only properly conducted long term study led by Professor George Waring at Emory University (formerly the "champion" of RK in the USA). Professor Waring himself has not performed RK for at least 5 years and only performs excimer laser surgery. I cannot stress enough the long term risks of this treatment with a very high percentage of people going long sighted as these studies show. In addition, the eyesight will fluctuate daily. Finally, something I found very useful was contacting other people on this website. All at present have good daytime vision - note that the long sighted vision progresses over time in these studies so most people won't have a problem for some time with that.The universal problem that everyone has though is night time star burst. The reason for this is the light enters the eyes refracted through the incisions which enter the field of vision when the pupil dilates at night. I had responses from many LCRS patients listed here and all have starburst! They get used to this, but current day lasik is so far in advance of this treatment it is quite unbelievable that anyone would opt to get RK/microsurgery done in possession of the full facts. I next went to the London Vision Clinic to find out the real risks/benefits of current Lasik. Note that their rating is 100% on this site. They really seem to be the most up to date in this field and I will post there once I have researched current lasik to my satisfaction, and made a decision whether to get surgery done or not based on the current day facts.

Viv - in response to your enquiry about patients who have been treated at our Manchester clinic, try clicking on www.TheGiftOfSight.com. If you select the "Search" function, then choose "Manchester" from the drop-down list of Ultralase clinics, you can read the testimonials of some of the patients treated there.

An update following my 6 week check-up after having bi-lateral LASEK (on 15/11/03):- Still 20/20 which is good. Slight problem with looking at very near objects but I've been told that it is early days and that this is due to the slight over correction. I am seeing am improvement day by day..