Cateract Surgery with Toric Lenses

I you could see well after surgery, but less well now, then obviously something has changed.  Sometimes toric lenses rotate after surgery before healing is complete, which changes their power and can make vision worse. You should be sure to have your doctor check to see what is going on in case the lens needs to be rotated back. That is the most likely issue and there is a good chance they can fix it. Unfortunately also any IOL can move slightly after surgery, further forward or backward, which changes their focal point and either improves vision or makes it worse, making you perhaps slightly myopic or hyperopic That is part of why they typically wait a few weeks after surgery for your vision to stabilize before considering whether to prescribe contacts/glasses. The formulas to determine lens power aren't exact, parlty since they can't predict exactly how the lens will settle after surgery, so although they are usually accurate, occasionally someone will need a slight bit of correction.

Another possibility a small percentage of people experience is PCO, posterior capsular opacification, which is a clouding of the lens by cells growing over top of it and causing vision to be clouded. A minor laser procedure, a YAG treatment, usually clears that up easily.

 Also you are still   in the intial healing period so you should have the doctor check to be sure there isn't some sort of complication like swelling. 

I had torics implanted 9 and 7 weeks ago and dealt with a film over my eye (just one) until about 2-3 weeks ago....using lubricating eyedrops helped me....patience was the eye to dealing with a variety of unexpected conditions, all of which have disappeared by now.

Just to clarify....my doc added I could use lube drops (pref. preservative-free) up to about 4 times a day but that I should wait about 10 minutes until before or after using the RX drops.  I had a good outcome...hope you do, too.

Dear Cathy,

I had a similar situation as you. I had a toric lens implanted when they did the cataract surgery. The only difference is ,prior to the cataract surgery I had what's called an epi-retinal membrane pucker. That's in the back of your eye by the retina and the macular .over the years some scarring had occurred when I had some floaters and flashing lights in that Eye. It didn't bother me prior to the cataract surgery. Apparently sometimes it gets worse after cataract surgery. When they remove the fluid from eye to do the cataract surgery that often makes that membrane pucker more. It was very obvious to see in the pictures of My eye when they did some diagnostics. I could see how it changed from before the cataract surgery and after the cataract surgery. This is remedied by having that membrane peeled off. I know it sounds very involved and scary but, apparently it's a pretty common surgery. I've just had it done two weeks ago. And while there is a lot of swelling in my eye I and my vision isn't great yet I can see every day a little bit of improvement.

I joined this forum with a problem similar to yours and I've updated a few times as to my situation. This is the first time I'm writing on the forum about what I've had done.

The Doctor Who did my cataracts over and over again kept saying use the drops it's just swelling etc. etc. if I had listened to him I would still be waiting for some improvement without getting any. I finally went for a second opinion to another cataract man who mentioned that the problem was not the swelling from the cataracts but this epiretinal membrane pucker. He recommended a very renowned retinal specialist for me to see and as I said. I had the surgery two weeks ago.

While my vision is a great yet I can see a difference. As mentioned the pictures of my I showed a lot of swelling which the doctor said is very unusual so I can understand why my vision isn't as good as I was hoping. But at least I am seeing improvement even if a little day by day.

My suggestion to you is go to your eye doctor or retinal specialist have him take some diagnostics of the retina and the macula and see if the situation exists for you.

I know how difficult situation like this can be and I hope that all of these people who have replied have given you some way to check out what's going on with your eye. Good luck.

I had a toric lens implanted in my right eye in February and my left eye in March. I developed PCOs after about 4 weeks in each eye and had to have YAG laser surgery twice in one and once in the other,