Tweet
Hi all !! I am using this forum for 1 year now, and I am finally writing my first message, in order to share my experience and frustration, with the hope that some of you might have the time to read this long post, and might have some answers that none of the many doctors that I have consultated were able to provide.
I've got my FemtoLasik with the Zeiss M90 machine exactly 2 years ago in a well known clinic in Italy. Things went roughly good for the first 6 months (excluding 1 month of serious dryness that I have easily reecovered with 3 weeks regime of ThealozDuo, then things went great for the following 2 months), but the situation collapsed the day after I've got the usual 6 months check. I do not what went wrong, probably the shirmer test, or the drops used to measure the pressure of the eyes, but from the following day eyes were dry, and artificial drops useless. It has been a year and half since then, and the eyes have not recovered yet.
My eyes before LASIK were robust and healthy. I was a regular user of contact lenses since the age of 14 (i ve got my LASIK at 38). I could have used contact lenses (Acuvue Oasys) indefinitely without any single problem (I was able to use them for more than 15 hours per day, and sometimes due to frequent intercontinental flights, I could have used them also for 24 hours without any issue). I have never used any artificial drops in my life, never had eye infection, inflammation of conjunctivitis. My eyes were great, but given that I knew that contact lenses were not healthy for the eyes, I decided to go for LASIK before my 40s. I discovered too late that LASIK is much worst than contact lenses.
At the visit the Dr identified me as a perfect candidate, although my Shirmer (at 5 minutes) were not great, 6mm (left eye) 8 mm(right eye). But, my OSDI was 0, and when she asked for any simptomes of dry eyes, I had not clue what she was talking about. So, we decided to go ahead with the procedure.
I did not use my contact lenses for 2 months before going through LASIK, in order to make eyes healthiest possible before the procedure. I started TOBRADEX a few days before, and continued this for the following 3 weeks. Together with ThealozDuo (artificial drops). The only thing that I did wrong was that after the surgery, I forgot to put artificial drops when I arrived at home, and I suffered of major burning sensation for a few hours (I was not able to keep my eyes open), than I started using artificial drops and things got normal. The day after my eyes were watering a lot for the full day, but my vision was ok, and although not perfect, I guess all this was in the order of usual post-lasik recovering.
The first month and half things were fine, slowly recovering, without any significant bad simptomes..things got just better day by day, without major symptomes of dry eyes. I stoped using regularly artificial drops after 3 weeks following LASIK, and I started using them only randomly, just for washing the eye before going to sleep, for example, for precaution. After this period, a night I had to work till late in front of the computer, and on the following day something started bothering my eyes. Not really drynes yet, but floating and some simptomes of inflammation. I started checking different ophthalmologist (not the same of the surgery), and they just noted simptomes of conjunctivitis (but nothing serious, so not sure whether they have been really concerned about it). So, they just put me on Lotemax for a few days, and systane ultra. Things went up and down, until a 4th doctor 1 month later, put me on 4 drops per day of ThealozDuo for 1 month. This solved everything after a few days. I stopped using the drops, and I had my life back. All this happened on a very hot and dry summer.
Then, I had the already mentioned 6 months check, and boom, my eyes collapsed together with my certainties about my life. My shirmer at the 6 month check was 2 left eye and 5 right eye, but eyes did not bother me at all, till that day. After that, my eyes had dry eyes simptomes. I tried to solve this with artificial drops for the first 2 months, but it did not help. I actually started thinking that I was allergic to eye drops. Then, I ve got diagnosized with mild Blepharities, something that of course I have never heard about before. I tried to threat this with Blephaclean and first TOBRADEX for a couple of weeks, then switched to Lotemax for the following period. In the meantime, artificial drops did not really help. I visited many doctors including people at Moorfield Hospital in London.
Today, I have still dry eyes simptomes, which go from dryness and burining (luckily this happens more rarely). I have some floating some times, but also long period of no simptomes. I can live without simptomes for a full month, and things fall apart after that for another long period. I tried warm compress, but did not work much, different artificial drops (I am using HycosanExtra a that moment), but if I use them or not, it does not make any difference. So, I usually do not use any artificial tiers for the full day. Tried chloramphenicol ointment for 1 month and azysit drops. I am using Omega3 for more than a year, and keep cleaning my eyelids with Blephaclean. My eyes are watery (at least more watery than 1 year ago I feel), at least when my eyes are not totally inflamed. My eyes lids are puffy, and red. But, luckily my eye ballls have never been red, they are just white. I have also the impression that they are always wet, just because I always see a line of wetness between the eye lids and the eye ball. However, who really actually knows. I did not get any Shirmer test over the last year and half (also because I am now very afraid about it). But, doctors say that my problem is not about tiers production, but evaporative, so MGD. My eyes do not like strong lights, such as traffic lights and light of cars, but this only during the day, and I have the impression that this mostly depends from the level of the inflammation. Often, they do not like the brightness of computer screen. But, I have the impression that when eyes feel good, they are less bothered by lights. So, this might only depends from inflammation, and not from the surgery itself. My night vision is anyway always perfect, and I do not suffer from glares at all.
All ophthalmologists that I have visited (around 10 different ones) agree that I should not have the problems that I have, and based on what they see on my eyes, they all keep telling me that my eyes will heal, they are just taking more time than expected. Of course, I am very discouraged and I do not trust doctors anymore. However, I have been already enourmously long with this post, so I will safe you from my frustration, sadness and desperation for all this.
This is my first post, so sorry for having been so looong. As you can imagine I had all this on my belly for a while, and I wanted to share all information as possible, with the hope that some of you might suggest anything, or just want to share some thoughts trying to explain why all this is happening. I have an enormous amount of questions that I hope some of you might feel interested in engaging with: Did I do something wrong with the postSurgery? Was it a bad reaction to tobradex or other artificial tiers? Am I allergic to something? Was I not a right candidate for LASIK such as I have been told to be? or why this is happening? And what can I do differently. And, please forgive me the classic one, based on all details that I have shared here, for those who have seen this kind of post tons of times: will I ever heal, and take my life back?
Thanks a million to those who had the time to read this long post, and have any thoughts, suggestions, for ideas to share. Or, let me know if you have any further questions about details that I have missed to include to this post.
I've got my FemtoLasik with the Zeiss M90 machine exactly 2 years ago in a well known clinic in Italy. Things went roughly good for the first 6 months (excluding 1 month of serious dryness that I have easily reecovered with 3 weeks regime of ThealozDuo, then things went great for the following 2 months), but the situation collapsed the day after I've got the usual 6 months check. I do not what went wrong, probably the shirmer test, or the drops used to measure the pressure of the eyes, but from the following day eyes were dry, and artificial drops useless. It has been a year and half since then, and the eyes have not recovered yet.
My eyes before LASIK were robust and healthy. I was a regular user of contact lenses since the age of 14 (i ve got my LASIK at 38). I could have used contact lenses (Acuvue Oasys) indefinitely without any single problem (I was able to use them for more than 15 hours per day, and sometimes due to frequent intercontinental flights, I could have used them also for 24 hours without any issue). I have never used any artificial drops in my life, never had eye infection, inflammation of conjunctivitis. My eyes were great, but given that I knew that contact lenses were not healthy for the eyes, I decided to go for LASIK before my 40s. I discovered too late that LASIK is much worst than contact lenses.
At the visit the Dr identified me as a perfect candidate, although my Shirmer (at 5 minutes) were not great, 6mm (left eye) 8 mm(right eye). But, my OSDI was 0, and when she asked for any simptomes of dry eyes, I had not clue what she was talking about. So, we decided to go ahead with the procedure.
I did not use my contact lenses for 2 months before going through LASIK, in order to make eyes healthiest possible before the procedure. I started TOBRADEX a few days before, and continued this for the following 3 weeks. Together with ThealozDuo (artificial drops). The only thing that I did wrong was that after the surgery, I forgot to put artificial drops when I arrived at home, and I suffered of major burning sensation for a few hours (I was not able to keep my eyes open), than I started using artificial drops and things got normal. The day after my eyes were watering a lot for the full day, but my vision was ok, and although not perfect, I guess all this was in the order of usual post-lasik recovering.
The first month and half things were fine, slowly recovering, without any significant bad simptomes..things got just better day by day, without major symptomes of dry eyes. I stoped using regularly artificial drops after 3 weeks following LASIK, and I started using them only randomly, just for washing the eye before going to sleep, for example, for precaution. After this period, a night I had to work till late in front of the computer, and on the following day something started bothering my eyes. Not really drynes yet, but floating and some simptomes of inflammation. I started checking different ophthalmologist (not the same of the surgery), and they just noted simptomes of conjunctivitis (but nothing serious, so not sure whether they have been really concerned about it). So, they just put me on Lotemax for a few days, and systane ultra. Things went up and down, until a 4th doctor 1 month later, put me on 4 drops per day of ThealozDuo for 1 month. This solved everything after a few days. I stopped using the drops, and I had my life back. All this happened on a very hot and dry summer.
Then, I had the already mentioned 6 months check, and boom, my eyes collapsed together with my certainties about my life. My shirmer at the 6 month check was 2 left eye and 5 right eye, but eyes did not bother me at all, till that day. After that, my eyes had dry eyes simptomes. I tried to solve this with artificial drops for the first 2 months, but it did not help. I actually started thinking that I was allergic to eye drops. Then, I ve got diagnosized with mild Blepharities, something that of course I have never heard about before. I tried to threat this with Blephaclean and first TOBRADEX for a couple of weeks, then switched to Lotemax for the following period. In the meantime, artificial drops did not really help. I visited many doctors including people at Moorfield Hospital in London.
Today, I have still dry eyes simptomes, which go from dryness and burining (luckily this happens more rarely). I have some floating some times, but also long period of no simptomes. I can live without simptomes for a full month, and things fall apart after that for another long period. I tried warm compress, but did not work much, different artificial drops (I am using HycosanExtra a that moment), but if I use them or not, it does not make any difference. So, I usually do not use any artificial tiers for the full day. Tried chloramphenicol ointment for 1 month and azysit drops. I am using Omega3 for more than a year, and keep cleaning my eyelids with Blephaclean. My eyes are watery (at least more watery than 1 year ago I feel), at least when my eyes are not totally inflamed. My eyes lids are puffy, and red. But, luckily my eye ballls have never been red, they are just white. I have also the impression that they are always wet, just because I always see a line of wetness between the eye lids and the eye ball. However, who really actually knows. I did not get any Shirmer test over the last year and half (also because I am now very afraid about it). But, doctors say that my problem is not about tiers production, but evaporative, so MGD. My eyes do not like strong lights, such as traffic lights and light of cars, but this only during the day, and I have the impression that this mostly depends from the level of the inflammation. Often, they do not like the brightness of computer screen. But, I have the impression that when eyes feel good, they are less bothered by lights. So, this might only depends from inflammation, and not from the surgery itself. My night vision is anyway always perfect, and I do not suffer from glares at all.
All ophthalmologists that I have visited (around 10 different ones) agree that I should not have the problems that I have, and based on what they see on my eyes, they all keep telling me that my eyes will heal, they are just taking more time than expected. Of course, I am very discouraged and I do not trust doctors anymore. However, I have been already enourmously long with this post, so I will safe you from my frustration, sadness and desperation for all this.
This is my first post, so sorry for having been so looong. As you can imagine I had all this on my belly for a while, and I wanted to share all information as possible, with the hope that some of you might suggest anything, or just want to share some thoughts trying to explain why all this is happening. I have an enormous amount of questions that I hope some of you might feel interested in engaging with: Did I do something wrong with the postSurgery? Was it a bad reaction to tobradex or other artificial tiers? Am I allergic to something? Was I not a right candidate for LASIK such as I have been told to be? or why this is happening? And what can I do differently. And, please forgive me the classic one, based on all details that I have shared here, for those who have seen this kind of post tons of times: will I ever heal, and take my life back?
Thanks a million to those who had the time to read this long post, and have any thoughts, suggestions, for ideas to share. Or, let me know if you have any further questions about details that I have missed to include to this post.
Comment