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Cataract surgery visual outcomes with severe myopic vision

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jennifer50623
jennifer50623

I am 38. I have a cataract in my left eye, that I am scheduled to have surgery for. And I have pretty severe myopia. My contact lens prescription was -12 in my left eye, before the cataract, and its -9 in my right eye. I see well in my right eye at all distances with a contact lens in, but apparently there is the very beginning signs of a cataract in that eye as well. I guess I have some astigmatism in my left cataract eye also, but I wasn't told any actual number value for it. I don't correct for any astigmatism with my contact lenses.

I am having some trouble in my research finding out how having very severe myopia effects my options and what expectations I should have for vision post surgery. All the reading I have done is basically on people with about -5 D or better. I'm like twice that. There are toric lenses, multi-focals, EFOV, mono-focals but with mini-monovision, ect. Lots of people seem to be achieving glasses free most of the time and are happy.

My doctor seemed to be much more pessimistic about my vision when I met with him. He made it seem like I would most likely need glasses most of the time no matter what, and there are no guarantees of getting any outcome all that close to the chosen target. Plus he believed that I would have awful distortion between my two eyes and there wouldn't be really any option to help it, except getting the surgery on my good eye as well. That seems awful to me, because I may have years left before that eye gets presbyopia or a cataract bad enough to cloud my vision. And he couldn't really explain the why to what he was saying. So I can't really weigh out, does he just want to under sell and over deliver, or is he just a lazy surgeon that doesn't want to be precise enough with my new lens and thinks its fine just to adjust it all with glasses later, or is it just me having such poor vision to start with, that it really hurts my chances for a particular outcome? I left not really knowing what to do and I am meeting with him again next week to discuss my lens choices further, after I have done more research.

I really need some help from anyone else with fairly severe nearsightedness that has gone through getting a cataract surgery. How close was your vision to what you were going for? How is your range of vision without glasses now? Is it impossible to see with one eye fixed for distance and the other wearing a contact lens?

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  • JoeSemo
    JoeSemo jennifer50623

    Edited

    My vision before surgery was -11 with 4.5 astigmatism in the left eye and -13 with 2.5 astigmatism in the right eye. My right eye was/is my dominant eye. I had the left eye done first on September 1. I had the right eye done on September 17. I chose the Panoptix toric trifocal lenses. After the first surgery I had very good vision in my left eye so I went without glasses for 2 1/2 weeks before I had the right eye done. That was not ideal as my right eye was a -13 so of course it was totally blurry but my brain was able to compensate and I could do everything. I'm a teacher so that includes reading, on the computer, driving, etc. Because the other eye was uncorrected it was hard for me to tell how good my vision was. I could close my right eye and see that my left was good, but it wasn't perfect. I saw a kind of ghost outline around print on the computer. After 2 1/2 weeks I had the second eye done, also a Panoptix toric lens. I never considered any other option as my understanding is that these lenses work best with the Panoptix in both eyes so the eyes support each other. I just finished my last exam (vision and dilated to look at retina) on October 13 and finished my drops in right eye on October15. So I'm all done with my surgery! My outcome has been great! My two eyes definitely support each other as my vision is much better with both eyes than it is with either eye separately. I don't need glasses anymore for anything. I can read, watch TV, get on computer or Ipad, drive, garden, anything with no need for glasses. I don't see perfect--last test put me at about 20/25. However, I see better than I did with my expensive progressive lens glasses made from expensive high-index composite materials. I do see pretty big halos around headlights and streetlights at night. Can I drive? Yes. Is it an issue? A little. I don't drive at night very often, and even when I am out at night it's usually with my wife, so she can drive. But I have driven alone at night and it wasn't a big deal. My understanding is that most people learn to neurally adapt to this and it takes from 4 to 6 months. But I'm OK with what it's like now. So put me down as a success story as I went from being totally dependent on glasses to completely glasses free and I love my new vision!

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