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Speaker: ReLex SMILE method for myopic astigmatism less invasive

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DENVER – Marc Bloomenstein, OD, FAAO, said a new surgical procedure maintains the integrity of the cornea while correcting myopia with astigmatism, here at the Optometric Council on Refractive Technology symposium during the American Academy of Optometry.

As part of an update on astigmatism treatment, Bloomenstein discussed ReLex (refracting lenticular extraction) SMILE (small-incision lenticule extraction).

"These incisions are basically allowing us to go in and manually extract the stromal tissue," he said.

According to Bloomenstein, the method entails no stromal hydration, no laser fluence projection and no reflection losses while maintaining the integrity of the cornea and causing less nerve damage.

"I think this is going to be the year of corneal integrity," he said. "And more importantly, as 2015 comes around, we're going to start seeing things like hysteresis values and start looking at how we can maintain the strength of our patients' corneas. This procedure has the potential to do that."

The only variable is the accuracy of the laser, Bloomenstein said.

Bloomenstein shared data presented in London at the European Society of Cataract & Refractive Surgeons meeting in 2014, in which researchers utilized the Zeiss 500 kHz Visumax Femtosecond laser.

The study included 94 eyes of 47 patients operated on using the SMILE method. In all of the cases, medium and high myopia were combined with astigmatism.

Preoperatively, the spherical refractive component was -5.7 D, plus or minus 0.11 D, and the cylindrical component was -2.01 D, plus or minus 0.8 D, Bloomenstein said.

"By 3 months, the spherical component was 0.03 D, and the cylinder was down to 0.25 D," he noted. "This is now a less invasive way for us to be able to go in there."

He also noted that intraoperative and postoperative complications were not observed.

Bloomenstein told attendees: "When we start talking about new technology and the things we can start looking at, to me, this is something that is definitely impressive." – by Chelsea Frajerman

Disclosure: Bloomenstein is on a speaker's panel and/or an advisor for Alcon, AMO, Allergan, Akorn, Bausch + Lomb, BioTissue, BVI and TearLab. He has no financial interest.