I've had cataract surgery 2 weeks ago and still blurry

Whew what a comment for a doctor to make. Have you had a second opinion? I am going next week for oneto a Dr. highly reccomended by a cousin of mine, and i"m going to wait and see what he says. I didn"t need glasses before to drive but felt that my difficultios were from the cataract as I had no problem before it developed. Certainly if glasses will help for driving I'll give it a try.

 I would have DEMANDED a better explanation from your Dr. for your diffculties.

I know that it takes time for things to heal but since your Dr. said there is no inflamation he should be held accountable for at least some ideas. I hope your vision gets better as well. Good luck

It has been a nightmare to say the least.  My vision was 20/30 before surgery and is now 20/50.  He said his job was to make by eye healthy and now it is because I no longer have a cataract. It's just really hard for me to understand how my vision is worse after removing the cataract.  He said that I should be happy b/c I can correct to 20/20 with glasses.  I know glasses are not a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I had no idea that this was a possibility after cataract removal.  He had offered me a corrective lense before surgery that would alleviate me having to wear reading glasses but I opted not to do this b/c I don't have to wear them often.  At the follow up he made the comment that I should be glad that I didn't get that lens b/c if the one that he used bothered me I would have really hated the corrective lens.   He really has no explanation of why my vision is worse other than he may used the wrong sized lense.  He had a huge chip on his shoulder when I went into my follow up. He also said because I'm younger than the average person who has a catact (I'm 47) I shouldn't expect as much clarity as most people experiene.  I really wished that he would have told me this BEFORE surgery.  I would not have gotten the surgery had I known.  I was only having difficulties driving at night, now it's day and night.  The light sensitivity is through the roof.  It's difficult for me to go into any brightly lit store.  It sends my eye into overload.   I just really want answers as to why this simple surgery has caused me so much grief.  He got me out of there quick and just told me to follow up with my regular eye dr.  I do have an appointment with another surgeon next week.  I'm really hoping that I can get some answers  

 

Light sensitivity is extremely common after cataract surgery since the new lens lets in far more light than the clouded natural lens did, so it is unlikely to be due to any problem. I had to turn my computer monitor brightness down to 0 for the first several weeks after my surgery and to wear sunglasses outside at times when I wouldn't have needed them, though eventually I got used to it after a few weeks.  I don't notice things being noticeably bright anymore and can be outside without sun glasses. Though it is best to wear sun glasses since unless you got a blue blocking lens (some are, mine isn't) the artificial lens lets in more UV than the natural lens did. 

re: "I shouldn't expect as much clarity as most people experience"

That seems backwards since the rest of the eye should be in better condition than someone older.  I've never heard that before and I know of a few patients within a few years of your age that have good distance vision.  I had my surgery at the also atypically young age of 52 and had  almost 20/15 vision at distance by a week after surgery.

​If your vision can be corrected to 20/20 with glasses then it seems most likely the lens power was off and that there isn't anything else wrong. They consider that a success because with a cataract they wouldn't have been able to correct your vision to 20/20 because of the clouding. 

Unfortunately determining the lens power isn't an exact science. They use statistics to determine based on the result of past patients with similar eye measurements what power you will likely need. That isn't guaranteed to work but is merely an educated guess. Usually for most people the results are fairly accurate, the results seem more likely to be off for those who needed strong glasses beforehand (likely because there are fewer data points from similar patients, though there are guesses that there may be errors in the equipment measuring highly nearsighted eyes).  However even if mistakes in lens power from people with fairly normal vision beforehand are rare, *someone* unfortunately winds up being the "statistic" whose lens power was off, and that might be what happened in this case.

It is possible it could also have been a mistake, like the wrong lens ordered, or a manufacturing error.  I would ask them what the formulas said your lens power should be (one of the most common pieces of equipment they use for that is an IOL Master which prints out what the formulas recommend for an IOL power) and what lens power you actually received. 

If the lens power is off, it is possibel for them to correct it either via glasses, contact lens, laser correction like PRK or LASIK, or  via either another surgery to replace the lens (which involves risk since it is surgery, even if its fairly safe like the original cataract surgery).

It sounds like you shouldn't worry about what your distance vision will be yet due to the inflammation. Even without inflammation It often takes 3-4 weeks for the distance vision to settle down enough to where they will give people a prescription for any needed glasses, since the lens can move a little bit forward or backward while healing and that changes its power. Occassionally they need to wait 2-3 months. It may be that you will be lucky and your distance vision will improve and you won't need any correction, but unfortunately that isn't guaranteed (see the reply I just posted to kim94356 regarding lens power). 

to me it sounds like he didn't care weather u could see or not. something has to change here. the chip he's holding dearly to or more information for what to do

also what type of anesthesia did you get? was your eye put totally to sleep our could you see during operation? were you yourself awake our asleep during operation? have to have all the input right if you want to try to figure out the cause.

I lens I received was for distance only as I decided to go mono vision . I had a retinal re attachment on the other eye and it left me with mono vision so I decided to stay with that. It was the premium single vision( I think that's the right term) .not sure on the anesthesia but I wasn't completely out. I was talking to the doctor during it. 

Linda,

how is your vision now. I had IOL implanted 3 week back. Day 1 after surgery was 25/25 and then I see my vision blurry. Went to 2 week check and doctor said its inflammation but eye is fine. Just wanted to see if for you blurry vision is gone and after how long.

thanks

Rich