Hi Glen,

I read your response to my myopia question regarding the 1.25 myopia in my left eye. I don't understand what do you mean by there might be more then just simple refractive error. Are you saying that my surgeon might have made a mistake on my left eye? Well, I did my lasik surgery when I was about 21 years old, and maybe my eye hasn't stabilize yet. But from what I understand after your passed certain age, your eyes start to stabilize right? Do you know of any literature on this?

The thing is I went to my eye doctor about a month ago and he performed some test on me and told me that my eye is fine just some myopia in the left eye, but after I read your response, I am a bit concern b/c it sounds like my eye is not fine and that there could have been some mistake?

Tina

From Tina's previous post in another thread:

>I never knew that people who has
>myopia are at an increase risk
>for retinal detachment that just sounds
>really scary and worries me.
>I did lasik about 5 years
>ago, and before that my vision
>was 6.25 and 6.75, so does
>this mean that I might have
>retinal detachment some day? Also
>I notice that my left eye
>is getting blurry. I went
>to the doctor and he said
>that my vision is now 1.25,
>can I wear contacts in that
>eye? Will wearing contacts after
>lasik increase retinal detachment? Thanks
>for any clarification.

Hi Tina,

No, I’m not saying your original surgeon made a mistake, what I am saying is that your blurry vision may be more than just simple refractive error (myopia).

Your blurry vision could be from dry eyes, epithelial remodeling, high order aberrations (HOA), or many other things that can make vision blurry, but this is easy to check. If you can be fully corrected to good vision with glasses, then your problem is apparently simple refractive error. If glasses do not provide good corrected vision, then there may be something more that needs to be evaluated.

The doctor who examined you is in a much better position to tell you the health of your eye and the type of refractive error than I would ever be.

And to respond to your original question, retinal detachment is a complication of high myopia. The reason for this is that people who are myopic have eyes that are elongated. This elongation can put extra stress on the retina. Even though your cornea was changed by LASIK to provide better vision, the length of your eye is the same.

Although you were myopic, you were originally a moderately high myope and would probably not be considered a very high risk for retinal detachment. When you had your examination, your doctor undoubtedly evaluated the health of your retina and would have told you if problems were brewing. If you are not sure, contact your doctor and ask if any retinal abnormalities were observed.

Glenn Hagele
Council for Refractive Surgery Quality Assurance
http://www.USAeyes.org
http://www.ComplicatedEyes.org

I am not a doctor.