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LASEK may induce fewer night-vision effects than LASIK
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CLEVELAND — Laser epithelial keratomileusis was found to induce fewer “starburst” phenomena than LASIK in a study reported here.
Bruce Larson, MD, of Loyola University in Chicago, reported the outcomes of a study comparing the visual disturbances of patients after LASIK vs. LASEK at the International Congress on LASEK and Advanced Surface Ablation.
Dr. Larson, a LASIK patient himself, has had a personal interest in starbursts since he started experiencing them in 1999.
“I would see varying sizes of these effects around bright lights at nighttime,” he said. “I realized, if I had them, there were probably a lot more people with them, too.”
To determine how severe the starburst phenomenon was in post-LASIK patients, Dr. Larson developed a device he calls a glareometer.
“The glareometer tests for starbursts and grades the severity of the glare,” Dr. Larson said. “It’s an effective way to quantify these night effects.” After testing a number of LASIK patients in his practice with the homemade device, Dr. Larson said he was “shocked” to discover that most of them regularly saw starbursts.
“Ninety percent of my patients were testing positive for starburst phenomenon,” he said. Dr. Larson then tested a cohort of 45 myopic eyes that had undergone either LASIK or LASEK.
“Results showed that LASIK produced significantly more starbursts than LASEK, with a larger diameter for each effect,” Dr. Larson said. The size of the starbursts in LASIK patients, as measured by the glareometer, averaged 20 mm in radius, while LASEK patients’ starbursts averaged a 10.7 mm radius, he said.