Lasik and Mountain Climbing, Are there Any Risks with the Altitude?

I'm going to have to disagree with Dr Chynn. The evidence shows that LASIK is safe with high altitude climbing. Many climbers of Mt Everst have in fact had LASIK.  LASIK has also been used for years by Naval fighter pilots without adverse effects. 

 

This answer is coming from a surgeon who performs both LASIK and advanced surface treatments!

Don't worry about any altitude effects with LASIK. that would be extremely uncommon and likely limited to patients that had very high rx treatments and/or have resultant weakened corneas and poor vision already.    Radial Keratotomy, a procedure where we used to make several incisions in the cornea to flatten it, did result in weakness and altitude related issues/blurring.   RK was replaced by laser treatments in the early 90's.  

i trained with an eye surgeon at Harvard 20 years ago who had a very early LASIK, and then tried to climb up either Everest or K2 (the 2nd highest mountain in the world). his flap decompensated, and he lost vision, and went temporarily blind at the summit, and had to be medi-vac'd out. once he returned to a normal lower altitude, his vision went back to normal

you will not have this problem after LASEK or epiLASEK, which are both Advanced Surface Ablations (ASAs), which are flap-less, so there is no flap to be compromised

so don't get a cutting procedure like LASIK or IntraLase if you are going to be a serious climber, get a noncutting ASA procedure, like LASEK or epiLASEK