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Surgeon: New excimer laser exceeds expectations
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ALICANTE, Spain — With the new Schwind Amaris excimer laser system, which "redefines perfection in corneal refractive surgery," the sixth generation of excimer lasers is born, according to a surgeon speaking here at the Alicante Refractiva International meeting.
Jorge L. Alió, MD, PhD, Ocular Surgery News Europe/Asia-Pacific Edition Editorial Board Chairman and chairman of the Alicante meeting, described his early surgical results and impressions of the laser system.
Dr. Alió said the Amaris has a repetition rate of 500 Hz, delivering a 0.54-mm diameter super-Gaussian profile beam, which ensures high ablation accuracy and uniquely smooth treatment surfaces. The automatic advanced fluence level adjustment allows 80% of the corneal ablation to be carried out with a high fluence level, automatically lowering the power in the final refining stages.
Dr. Alió noted that one of his favorite features of the laser is its 5-dimensional turbo eye tracker. The feature compensates not only for horizontal and vertical displacement, but also for horizontal and vertical rotation and cyclotorsion, "facilitating unequaled precision in the positioning of each individual laser pulse," he said.
Automatic monitoring of pupil size ensures additional safety; illumination is automatically adjusted in such a way that, throughout the treatment, the pupil is exactly the same size as it was during preliminary testing. Real-time online pachymetry also displays all changes in corneal thickness at all stages of the procedure.
Finally, Dr. Alió said, "you can choose between aberration-free and customized wavefront treatment profiles," and "the Schwind-CAM software calculates the size of the optimal transition zones."
Dr. Alió is participating in the multicenter study of the Amaris. Of the 389 eyes that have been treated so far with the aberration-free profile, 100% are within 1 D of intended correction and 92% of the eyes achieved 20/20 or better uncorrected visual acuity at 1 month, he said.