Lasik Complications

I'm not sure I'd call it a complication, but the most common would be the potential need for a touch-up, or enhancement. This is a second surgery to fine-tune the initial result. The risk of needing this depends on your starting prescription, the laser used, whether wavefront technology is used, and the experience and skill of the surgeon. In my hands, the risk is below 5% for small to medium prescriptions, but climbs to 10% or even higher for very severe prescriptions. Other common... more

The most common side effects include dryness and fluctuating vision during the healing phase, a need for a second procedure, called an enhancement, or vision which is great but not perfect.  LASIK is one of the safest elective procedures performed.

In my opinion, the most serious potential complication after LASIK is infection. In my 17 years of experience, and 71,000 cases, I have never had an infection after LASIK. This is a byproduct of diligent preoperative and postoperative care,  and surgical technique, not luck. I tell patients that the risk of infection from LASIK exists for only about 4-5 hours.....from the moment I start the procedure, until about 5 hours postop. By that point, the surface of the cornea has healed back an more

LASIK is one of the most frequently performed surgeries in the world today, and fortunately, complications are relatively uncommorn. This somewhat depends on how one defines complication. If it includes getting a result that is less than a perfect correction, then one might say that the rate is higher. Most consider complications to be something that was unanticipated or unwanted. Most complications had to do with the first step in LASIK, making the corneal flap. By having the... more