Ultralase

Have had surgery on both eyes and problems with both - am awaiting Ultralase's suggestion for what I do now. Will keep you posted. Check check and double check before proceeding.

I had my eye treatment in the Leeds clinic at Easter and I thought that it was wonderful at first. I was recommending this treatment to other people because my sight was wonderful at first. I know that there is a period of settling down with the eyes and I don't know if my eyes have settled yet. I have had various appointments for check-ups, all with different people, which isn't nice, I don't know there names as I only get an appointment card with a time on it. I don't know whether these follow-ups are performed by opticians as non of this has been explained to me. My sight is deteriorating and they are keeping an eye on this, but every time I go to an appointment I am told something different. At the one before last I was told that I would have to have some tests and to make an appointment which would last more than an hour. This was fine but I had to find a babysitter as children won't sit still that long and I live about half an hour away from the clinic. When I arrived I waited to see the 'person', when I finally got in to the consultation room a very abrupt young man looked at my eyes, didn't mentiong the testing that I was supposed to be there for and told me to use artificial tears for a while because this could be causing the pobblem. I left after ten minutes and was told to make another appointment in a couple of months, which I am just about to do. I feel that I just don't know what is going on with my eyes. I have no information as to whom I have seen. At first I felt wonderful about my eyes but now I just don't know if I am being given the run around to keep me quiet. To make another appointment and then to come out not knowing what is going on is very frustrating, I just wonder how long this is going to go on for. I hope that I get sorted out as soon as possible. I will keep you posted.

Please see below complaint re Cardiff clinic. Dear Sirs I wish to complain about your Cardiff Centre. I was booked there today for a consultation to assess my suitability for Lasik. I had already been tested by another company and had been found suitable but given the positive feedback on lasik-eyes.co.uk I decided to go to Ultralase and intended to have the laser surgery next week. I would point out that I live in Pembrokeshire and the journey is 2.5 hrs each way to Cardiff. Upon being tested at your Cardiff clinic your optician, Yvonne, advised me that the prescription in my right eye was different from the one I had brought from my optician and the eye was .75 of a dioptre better than prescribed and that my right eye was -3.5 not -4.25. I was amazed by this as my prescription had been stable for 11 years, the prescription I had on me was only a year old and I had also been tested only two weeks previously by Maxivision and again the right eye had been -4.25. I asked how this could happen as I did not know that eyes just got better on their own! She didn't really answer this and only stressed that I had more than enough corneal thickness to do a second operation if they got it wrong the first time - great! I was advised to not proceed any further today and to have my eyes tested again when I got home and then return to Ultralase at a later date and repeat the tests. I was then moved on to the patient advisor. The patient advisor was a charming and helpful lady who suggested that I try a local optician in Cardiff who might be able to see me sooner (getting an opticians appointment in Pembrokeshire can take several weeks). On her advice I went to the local Specsavers and was quickly seen for a full eye test. I was lucky enough to be seen by a Dr Momdal an opthalmic surgeon who was visiting the practice. He gave me a thorough examination and again my right eye tested at -4.25. I was now rather concerned, not just for myself but for the fact that maybe there was an inadvertent fault with Ultralase's testing procedure so I hurried back to the clinic to tell them. When I returned to the clinic I again saw Yvonne. I was very surprised at her attitude on this occassion. Her only response to my new confirmation of my prescription was to tell me to leave and come back another time and try again. I pointed out that I lived in Pembrokeshire and it was a five hour round trip. She refused to test me further using relaxant eye drops and insisted that she stood by her prescription despite there now being three pieces of evidence to the contrary. I repeatedly asked if she could offer some explanation as to why or how such a difference could occur and could she reassure me in any way as I was now very unconfident about using Ultralase. She had no interest in either explaining or reassuring me and only again said she stood by her findings. My husband and I were frankly amazed at her attitude, her lack of interest in the patient and her inability to offer reassurance to a client of your company. Whilst I fully appreciate that one has to stand by ones professional reputation I was and remain concerned that a professional will not even consider that there is an error when all evidence points to that being the case and I can not bring myself to place myself in the hands of a company that would condone this sort of behaviour. Quite frankly if there is a possibility you are wrong then you investigate and make amends, you do not dogedly and arrogantly adopt a position that is of harm to your client. I am now left in the position of having my trust in the whole procedure put under severe strain and I do not know who to believe. How many more eye tests will I need to confirm if my prescription in -3.5 or -4.25? I think that if your optician had taken the 15 minutes necessary to test me again this afternoon instead of sending me on my way I would have felt more inclined to trust your company. As it is I feel that I would be better served by a company that was less arrogant, more empathetic to clients who travel hundreds of miles to see you and more willing to discuss issues rather than refuse to deal with them. I sincerely hope you will be looking into this matter. In the mean time I will be posting my review of your Cardiff centre on the lasik-eyes web site. Kind regards

I went to Ultralase for a consultation, the consultant friendly and answered all my Q.'s. HOWEVER, the prescription i got from Ultralase conflicted with the one i had got a week previously from another lasik consultant. I asked to be "tested" again by the other consultant - their prescription was the same as the first time. At my request, lenses were put in the test glassess (whatever they're called) from Ultralases prescription - things were blurry! I can only put this down to the fact that as i have large pupils, Ultralase didn;t put in any dilating drops - the other laser surgeon did - both times. By looking at the comments for Ultralase on this website, i must say, i am in the minority of negatives. I had my treatment done by the other abovementioned surgeon - i now have 20/20 vision, although it is still early days. Anyone with large pupils, - i suggest that you ASK for your pupils to be dilated, even if you are told that they don't need it. Feel free to email me...

I was treated by Paul Cherry at Guildford in July 2002. He did not notice that I had a cold sore - Herpes simplex B in the corner of my eye and as someone who is not an expert I did not know the relevance. Now almost a year later I have about 10% vision in my right eye, am in constant pain and Ultralase washed their hands of me and referred me to Moorefields eye hospital - if it had not been for an extremely helpful surgeon called Mathew Starr at ultralase who finally identified my symptoms I feel I would have been blind - the rest of them mis-diagnosed me on many many occasions

I was not the patient… my wife was. I was just obliged to watch the results. I will not comment further until she is out of the care of the eye hospital and we know what degree of sight she will now have. As long as everything goes well... you will be fine....... if not..... watch this space and I will tell you what Ultralase will do to help.

In June this year I had bilateral Lasik for a -4 prescription but I was not happy with the result and have since had additional treatment at another clinic. Although Ultralase has offered to pay the cost of this, I am still dissatisfied with Ultralase's treatment and their service.

I am going to LCRS on Jan 17th 2003 for surgery to my left eye and following it up with my right eye on Feb 14th. Looking at peoples comments especially Michelle and Angela's, I am a bit concerned at the starbursts experienced by both of you whilst driving in darkness. I need to drive to work and I am a bit concerned as to how it will affect my ability to drive. Is it a major problem? I am encouraged by all the favourable comments and I will hopefully be posting the same rave reviews.

I've had my initial consultation and was told I am a good candidate - think corneas and small pupils However my prescription's are something like -4 and -2, but am heavily astigmatic. My acuity with specs on is 6/6- and 6/7.5+. When they said I could lose 2 lines of best corrected vision, I slowly realised this meant even with specs on so. I would no longer be legal to drive. It doesn't mention the 2 lines in the brochures! Just results of 98% achieving 6/12. I always thought LASIK could improve your vision, but at best it can only match what you can see with glasses on. Given that, and the risk of side effects etc I have finally decided I won't be going ahead with treatment Having said that, they seemed very thorough and answered all of my questions. I will just add they do say in their forms you sign that you weren't pressured into making a decision. When I was told that I would have to come back for further tests, they were most surprised that I selected a Saturday date that was a month away and not come back much sooner (I didn't want to take another day off work) If my acuity was better, then I would probably have gone ahead with treatment with Ultralase. However, the consultation probably made me realise I hadn't done my homework properly, and would have prompted me to do more reading before going ahead immediately

Hello. Just wanted to thank you for your detailed comments - very helpful as I'm booked for my first operation on 30 Jan and, obviously, a bit apprehensive. Curious about the starbursts, and wondering how Michelle and Angela are doing now.