Wearing pre-cataract surgery glasses vs blank lens over operated eye when driving

Thanks David. Since my old glasses are rimless, I tried having the lens on the side of my operated eye removed and replaced with a blank lens, but that seemed weird as you mentioned. I'm not sure if that is more problematic than removing the lens entirely (not possible due to rimless glasses). I'm beginning to suspect that I may be sticking close to home while taking necessary trips with Uber.

Thanks David! My surgeon mentioned there is a 3 diopter difference now between my operated and unoperated eyes. Popping out the lens won't work because these are rimless. Do I understand correctly that with single vision distance glasses, if there is a big difference in power between the 2 sides of my glasses, the images from each eye will be noticeably different. I do experience that with my new old glasses (1 blank lens, 1 prescription lens). This was to be a test for mini-monovision, and I'm thinking I've learned that I may not be a good candidate! Thanks very much for letting me know the pros and cons of single vision distance glasses!

To test for monovision you should use contacts, not glasses. With contacts the difference in image size will be minimal. With glasses its quite noticeable so its not a good approximation of what to expect. I thought you just wanted driving glasses.

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Again for driving glasses I would just go to the Zenni website and find some cheap frames you like. For the un-operated eye use you old prescription, For the operated eye use -1.5 Sphere. This could cost you as little as $30 depending on the frames so if it doesn't work out it's not too big a deal. But probably good enough for driving between surgeries. The glasses should make the difference between your eyes close to zero. The images from each eye will be a slightly different size but I think you'd adapt to that quickly.

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Again though for a monovison test, use contacts.

Keep in mind that the blank lens is not a perfect simulation of mini-monovision as the image size from each eye will be slightly different. With mini-monovision the refraction adjustments are made at the IOL plane of both eyes and this mismatch in image size will essentially go away.

Thanks! Good to know!

I asked the technician yesterday about a new pair of glasses but he said they could not use my previous prescription as it is over a year old.

Go to another optical shop. One optical shop told me that years ago and I just went to another optical shop that used the same prescription.

The driving glasses are just temporary right? If you go to your optometrist they will charge you an arm and a leg. Why spend hundreds of dollars for glasses you're just going to toss once the second eye is done? Forget about your optometrist and order a pair of glasses online (I use Zenni) for maybe $50-$60. That includes frames and lenses. Use the old prescription for the un-operated eye (doesn't matter if it's a year old… it'll be close enough) and -1.5 for the IOL eye. If they work, great. If not, at least you didn't spent a fortune.

The woman I spoke to at the first optical shop kindly offered to send me the prescription so that I could shop around. It looks like Costco might order for me. I'll have to find out how much time I could actually wear the lens before my cataract surgery which is scheduled for Dec 7.

I had the impression that it was a legal requirement. My eyeglasses prescription is for progressives. I think someone said you shouldn't order progressives online?

I don't understand why I would use -1.5 for the IOL eye. Could you explain how that works?

The only thing I've done so far is to swap a blank eyeglasses lens for a prescription lens on the side of my operated eye. I paid $80 for the blank lens but don't like it! The technician helping me said the progressive lens on my unoperated side is an issue. I can ask my optometrist about single vision glasses for driving. Thanks for the suggestion.

What is it that you don't like about the blank lens arrangement? With this just a temporary solution until the second eye is done, I am not sure I would break the bank on more glasses now. If you can manage until the second eye is done and healed, it is probably worthwhile to get progressives for both eyes for situations when you need it. And even then, they may not be necessary. I would wait until the second eye is done, if it is at all possible.

I think it may be the different image sizes. Something is different of course and I wouldn't wear the glasses with the blank lens unless perhaps for driving. That said, I'm not sure which is safer, these modified glasses or no glasses. One thing I noticed when wearing the modified glasses is I am conscious of the bottom rim of the blank lens. Seems like it rides high but looking in the mirror it looks the same.

Seems to me it is worthwhile to keep in mind that this is only a temporary solution. The difference in image size bothered me to some degree, and I addressed it by wearing a contact instead of glasses most of the time. But, I still got used to the eyeglasses solution after a while.

My dry eye specialist said it would be OK to try a contact lens. My optometrist wrote a prescription and I called the optical shop to order. Wow! - $300 for one lens! Of course I asked for a gas permeable lens. I imagine soft lenses would be much less expensive?

You don't want gas permeable for an eye that's going to have cataract surgery soon. Hard contacts alter the shape of the eye enough that surgeons want you to stop wearing them for a considerable length of time before the surgery. Maybe when you just get one for a short period to try that's not the case, but even start down that path? With soft contacts I think they still want you to stop wearing them for a while before the surgery, but it's more like a week or two. For confirmed wearers of hard lenses it's liable to be 8 weeks.

Since I've worn hard contacts for over 50 years I'm facing that problem right now.

Just order soft daily contacts online

Daily soft contacts are in the order of 1$ each, with some a little more and some a little less. For a trial I would go with soft contacts. If you are near a Costco they will typically give you 5 contacts free for a trial. I like the Kirkland Signature contacts which are really the CooperVision MyDay lenses. Alcon Total 1 are good too.

Thanks Maura! I appreciate your input! I thought of asking for a gas permeable contact lens because I had such a difficult time removing the soft lenses. I'm glad you put the brakes on that idea! Looks like I'll be staying close to home for a month or so.

Thanks David. If I have a prescription for gas permeable hard lenses, I assume I would have to ask my optometrist for a different prescription for soft lenses?

My problem with soft contacts (back in the day) was getting them out. My finger tips are very dry and I'm wondering now if that's the reason. Do you know of a brand or model of soft lenses that are especially easy to this situation? Many thanks!

First, if your eyes have already been measured for IOLs, then you do not have to worry about contacts changing the shape of your eye. I wore contacts AFTER my eyes were measured right up until the day before the surgery. You could check with your clinic to see if they plan to take any more measurements. Soft contacts only have to be avoided for the week before measurements. Hard contacts are much longer - like one to two months.

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I am not that familiar with hard contacts, but I would assume contact prescription for correction would be the same as soft contacts. Soft contacts really only come in one size fits all, and if a certain brand does not "fit", then you need to try another brand.

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If you are a Costco member, at least in Canada they will give you 5 or so contacts for free to try. The minimum amount to purchase for the daily ones is 30 for about $30. I have tried about 6-7 different ones and these ones listed below would be my suggestion. There are two basic types of soft contact lenses. One is the extremely soft and flexible pure hydrogel ones. One example is the J&J Acuvue Moist lens. I got prescribed these and they are absolutely terrible to handle. I found them near impossible to get into my eye, and difficult to remove if you could even get them in. Avoid Acuvue Moist and all hydrogel lenses like the plague. A newer improved material is Silicone Hydrogel. The unfortunate reality is that some so called professionals are still recommending the pure hydrogel lenses. The silicone hydrogel material is less flexible and as a result much easier to handle. But they are still very comfortable and the good ones don't dry out and are very oxygen permeable. Based on my trials of 1 day disposable contacts that Costco was willing to give me free samples of, this is how I would rate them:

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1. CooperVision MyDay (Also sold as Kirkland Signature)
2. Alcon Total 1
3. J&J Acuvue Oasys 1 Day (available as a toric)

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   There is a newer Alcon lens called the Precision 1, which looks like it should be good but at the time Costco was not carrying it, so I never tried it.

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   Your other option may be to get a box of 30 from an online contact lens supplier. It should be reasonable cost. They may be less sticky about needing a prescription, but you should be able to use the one you have if they are. Keep in mind this is just a temporary solution until you have surgery on the second eye. Perfect vision in that eye is not going to be possible in any case due to the cataract.

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   If your prescription has a lower amount of cylinder (astigmatism), you can also get by with a non toric. Just add 50% of the cylinder to the sphere number and get that for sphere only. That was what I did, as the Kirkland Signature, which I used, does not come in a toric (at least in Canada). I believe the CooperVision MyDay is available as a toric.