My experience of the Symfony Toric lens

A minor note, PCO is the usual acronym rather than POC, for those doing any searches. Even if distance vision is good in that eye, its still possible PCO reduced vision slightly, which could tip the balance for when you need glasses for near. 

When you report eyesight results, what is likely of most interest is the prescription, to see if your near vision is being reduced by being left slightly farsighted perhaps which seems likely. Your best corrected distance vision might also be of interest,  in case perhaps your vision at any distance is being reduced by your visual system having some other factor reducing it.

 

please update me on your current vision since your post 2 months ago and also with hallow effects. thank you.

I have just completed a four month checkup (six months since the op on my right eye). I continue to manage pretty well without glasses, except in low light. An eye test shows no change in my vision compared with four months ago. There is slight capsular opacification behind both implants, which my surgeon thinks will need laser treatment within the next two years. It is possible that this might be having a small effect on my vision. I am sensitive to bright lights - which are sometimes surrounded by what looks a spiders web. This effect does not bother me and halos seem less significant than they were.

It is a real pleasure to be largely free of glasses after so many years.

All those readings are measures of visual acuity. Since they moderate links, I'd suggest just doing things like searches for "logMar chart" to see conversions between logMar and other metrics. At the moment if you google:

"visual acuity conversion chart" "civil aviation authority"

You turn up a chart indicating that N5 is a metric of near visual acuity which is the equivalent at 40cm of 20/30 or 6/9 quality vision.   If you google:

"The following is a list of environmental print that correlates to the acuity on a Near Vision Snellen Test Chart."

You'll see a couple of links that give examples of real world things that correspond to various near visual acuities, like that suprisingly 20/50 at near is good enough for small newprint. 

The 6/6+2 means that you read the 6/6 line, plus two letters from the line below indicating you are a bit better than 6/6, but not as good as the line below (which I didn't bother looking up, in the US I'm used to 20/20 type charts so I don't know offhand what is below 6/6).

 

If you google: logmar calculator

you can get an exact conversion for logMar and 0.04 is 20/21.9

hello, i have read this entire thread.  I would love updates from all the participents on their Symphony implants as to near, intramediate and far sharpnes of vision and also hallos since it has been a number of months since their implants.   I just had my first implant two weeks ago.  Vision was very blury first week, then improved a great deal the next few days but now at a stand still.  The only drawback to implant the surgon mentioned was possible hallows and that he would choose a model that was good for near vision at arms length, mentioning that beyond that it might be a bit blury but that further intramediate and far would be good.  I was upset about the blury vision and at the 8 day follow up for the first time he told me that my vision with implant will never be as good as glasses.  What! He never mentioned that before. Yes, then he went into it would get better with time and brain compenstation etc.  I went home and called the manufactor and gave them the model number and was told that it was a Tecnis, not a Symphony. WHAT!  I called the large practice and told them what I had just learned and they assured me they only order Symphony lens.  So I had my regular optomerist call the surgon and surgon said his group  (20 doctors) had stopped using the Symphony lens due to number of patient complaints, and reverted back to Tecnis.  On my first visit they had given me a brochure on Symphony lens, so I naturally assumed that was what i was getting and what I had researched.  Not at all happy.  I then went to see a 2nd surgon at another practice.  He only uses Symphony on his patients.  He advised me it would be ok to put Symphony in other eye or the longer range Tecnis so that my viewing computer would be clearer because right now my sweet spot for close vision with left IOL is 16 inches.  My current IOL in left eye is a Tecnis ZLB00.  So now I canceled my surgery for 2nd eye till I can get some answers.  Surgon wants to meet with me in two days to discuss IOLs. I am now trying to gather as much info as I can so I can make correct decision on which to put in other eye.  Any imput would be appreciated.  Oh one reason I may be pickly about focus is my vision was good before surgery, I had fast growing cataracts but my issue was only night driving.

Bruce,

I have had the Tecnis Symfony lens installed in both eyes. I am having no trouble with any distances from 8" to as far out as I can see, probably 1/2 mile. I am pleased. It has now been about 3 months since my first insertion.

Hi Bruce, It sounds like there is some confusion about the name of the lenses. Tecnis make a range of lenses of which Symfony Toric is one and it is these lenses which were implanted in me.

My eyesight has changed very little over the last two months and I remain very happy with the results. It seems to me that my near sight is very dependent on bright light to be able read small print (e.g. newsprint), but is otherwise perfectly normal. Halos around bright lights and starbursts continue, but I rarely drive at night and feel the benefits of being free of glasses after more than 60 years outweigh these disadvantages.

Thank you for responding. I know you said you were not having trouble with close vision, but can you please tell me if over time have the letters when reading become as sharp as they were before surgery when you wore glasses? Do you see hallows at night? Thank you.

You are correct, I should have been more specific. They implanted a multifocal Tecnis ZLB00 instead of the Symfony.

My vision is better than when I had glasses.  I needed my glasses updated,  but because I was getting my cataracts taken out, I wasn't about to invest in more glasses.

I have only had the Symfony Lens for a few months... since February,  and because my surgeon had to go back in to remove astigmatism,  the healing is still going on.  I don't need glasses,  and my vision is very clear.  I have a small amount of glare,  depending on how the light comes into my eyes I guess.  I don't use fancy terms, just plain old english...  it is what it is.  I would do it all over again.  I love being able to see like I did in my teens.

Hi Sharon - how is your night vision and driving with the Symfony lens? Do you have them implanted in both eyes?

My eyes are getting used to the lens.  I have Symfony Lens in both eyes.

The only lights that cause a problem are the bright white head lights,  the newer led lights that are on the newer cars.   But then, they bothered me before I had the surgery as well.