Before you plan to have lasik surgery, it’s important to carefully take its pros and cons into consideration. Although there are both advantages and disadvantages when you talk about lasik, the benefits which you derive from the surgery far outweigh the risks involved.
You would want to go for lasik surgery for various reasons, such as medical necessity, new career options that depend on natural vision while not allowing the use of contact lenses or glasses, or simply for leading a life free of glasses.
It’s important to balance the benefits with the risks before taking up on the decision to undertake the surgery. However, there’s no need to panic or worry about anything, because when we look at the statistics, as of 2008 over 6 million people have gone through lasik surgery worldwide, with only about 3% to 5% patients having post surgery complications – the majority have reported immense satisfaction and a positive improvement in the overall quality of their life after the surgery.
Below you will find some of the pros and cons of lasik surgery explain:
Pro: Experience freedom from eyeglasses and get rid of the daunting task of regularly wearing and caring for your contacts. Lasik allows the patient to start a fresh and hassle free life, with a much more active lifestyle, greater sports and outdoor participation, accompanied with a high self esteem. For ambitious people, doors open up and they are no longer restricted from career options such as navy pilots, airline pilots, and military personnel, which prohibit the contacts and glasses.
Con: Lasik surgery carries a high price tag and this expensive procedure isn’t even covered by insurance. Financing is available for people seeking easier ways. However this isn’t always reliable, and high interest rates can simply add up to the overall cost making it a less attractive option.
Pro: The long term costs associated with contact lenses and glasses are lessened, as the patient gets rid of the costs of maintenance including the purchase of new contact lens pairs or glasses replacement and annual examination. On the long run, these costs tend to add up and go beyond the price of lasik itself, without any cosmetic benefit or freedom.
Con: Although mostly treatable, there are certain risks involved and complications which may arise during the post surgery periods.
Pro: Surgeres, be they of any kind, carry their own risks and complications, some of them being permanent or complicated to treat. Lasik surgery probably has the lowest rates of complications when compared to all other eye surgeries, and most of these can be treated with a follow up, additional surgery. Also, most of them aren’t permanent in nature. Another positive factor with this particular surgery is that the recovery time is minimal; successful surgeries usually require only a day of downtime at the most.
The above list of the pros and cons associated with lasik eye surgery is brief and not at all comprehensive, therefore any additional questions that you may have should be directed to a qualified surgeon. The majority of patients, who undergo this surgery, believe that even though there are both pros and cons, the positive benefits are much greater than the potential negatives, and that their quality of life has significantly gone through a sea change and improved for the better.
