Laser in situ Keratomileusis shortly known as LASIK is an extra complicated process as compared with photorefractive keratectomy or PRK. It is done for the entire degrees of nearsightedness and makes use of microscopy using some clinical microscopes in its operation. The surgeon makes use of a knife known as microkeratome to incise a flap of corneal tissue, which can be observed using microscopy by means of clinical microscopes, and takes away the intended tissue underneath it using the laser, and then substitutes the flap.
The expertise of the surgeon is necessary in LASIK as to the PRK since he will be doing a cut. In the PRK process, the machine performs more of the work. Such activities can be performed better with the aid of microscopy using some clinical microscopes. It is being advised that when people need to undergo LASIK process, they should look for the qualified, experienced doctors to do this kind of surgical operation. The more LASIK procedures the doctor has performed the better because this is a surgeon-reliant operation.
There were about forty to forty-five percent refractive surgeries done by physicians with LASIK. It equates with about eighty thousand procedures. There are doctors who do not partake in the clinical trials and can opt to utilize the approved laser to do the LASIK procedures at their preference. Nonetheless, majority of the doctors utilizing LASIK are deemed off label and are not controlled by the Food and Drugs Administration or FDA.
The agency regulating the practice has ruled that any physician can do LASIK under the general practice of medicine in consideration of the best interest of the patient. There are doctors who consider LASIK as an appropriate procedure for the correction of the most serious or advanced refractive errors. They also stated that in terms of recuperation period, the patient who underwent LASIK recovers faster than those who endured PRK. Further, LASIK patients can view adequately that they can drive their vehicles at once and have good eye sight in just one week.
Nevertheless, there are still doctors who encourage the patients having low to moderate nearsightedness to undertake radial keratotomy or RK, which does not need the excimer laser and is a process being done to correct an earlier refractive problems. This process can be performed with the aid of microscopy using some clinical microscopes. In RK the cuts are performed in a radial pattern alongside the external area of the cornea with the use of a hand-held blade. Such cuts are intended to help flatten the curvature of the cornea, which can be observed in some clinical microscopes, hence permitting light rays to make entry in the eye in order to appropriately focus on the retina. The quantity and extent of the cuts ascertains the degree of correction achieved. Commonly, such process is still being performed for few people with extremely small corrections of myopia.
On RK, there are also doctors who do not favor the method. According to the studies about RK, cuts being done in this procedure that infiltrate around ninety percent of the cornea seem to weaken the structure of the eye. In addition to that, once the patient has undergone RK, he cannot undergo it again nor have PRK performed on him.