How does presbyopia affect vision?

Is it possible to correct presbyopia using lasers. eg LASIK?

What is PRELEX?

PRELEX history?

How does presbyopia affect vision?
If you are over 45 you may be beginning to notice your vision isn’t quite as good as it once was. Your eye is designed to adjust so that it can focus at distance and near, but as we age our lens becomes less flexible. As a result it is less able to see near objects clearly so we require reading glasses. Hyperopic (long-sighted) people, who have worn glasses all their life for distance vision, will now require bifocals. Myopes (short-sighted) in contrast often take their glasses off to read. If this sounds familiar, then PRELEX may be the vision correction for you.

Is it possible to correct presbyopia using lasers. eg LASIK?
No. Laser vision correction changes the curvature of the cornea. The cornea and the lens of the eye both play a role in focusing light rays onto the retina. As presbyopia is the deterioration in the lens’s ability to focus, surgery to the cornea will not correct the vision. Indeed, people who have had successful laser vision correction to correct their myopia or hyperopia will go on in later years to develop presbyopia. However presbyopia can be corrected by lens surgery known as PRELEX.

What is Prelex?
PRELEX is the name now given to the surgical procedure to replace the natural lens of your eye, which is no longer focusing correctly, with a multi-focal or pseudo-accommodative intra-ocular lens implant (IOL). While the application of the technology is new, the surgical techniques employed have been proven successful over many years of use. That’s because the procedure itself is similar to that used to treat cataract patients. The only difference between a cataract patient and a PRELEX patient is the clarity of the lens prior to surgery.

Prelex History
Although fixed-focus IOLs have been implanted for decades, the first truly multi-focal IOLs were implanted just over 10 years ago to treat patients with cataract. In the mid-1990s surgeons started implanting the multi-focal lens to treat presbyopia, even though the presbyopic patient did not have a cataract. This scientific data was first presented in 1997.

In 1998 an American ophthalmologist, Dr. Kevin Waltz, became the first eye surgeon in the world to undergo surgery himself and receive multi-focal lenses to replace the natural lenses in his own eyes. He labelled the procedure PRELEX which is short for PREsbyopic Lens EXchange. As an eye surgeon and a patient, Mr Waltz has lectured around the world, describing his amazing visual improvement, and explaining the reasons why. The results in the UK and in the USA have led a progressive group of international ophthalmologists to include PRELEX as part of their refractive surgery options. Their presbyopic patients are now able to have clear vision, reduce or eliminate their dependence on glasses.

Apart from less dependence on glasses another great advantage of PRELEX is you will never need treatment for cataracts.

next