doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com OT: Cataract Surgery

I know this is OT, but I�m preparing to have cataract surgery in both eyes very soon. I�m still pondering which inteaocular lens to go for. I think I�m going with the tried and true monofocal Medicare approved lens rather than the more investigational multifocal lens. Just wondering if any of you have experience with this. I�m thinking in terms of shooting I�m better off with the monofocal lens set for distance as opposed to the multifocal (which costs a lot more and isn�t covered by insurance), but I�m not 100% sure. Any ideas?

Buzz, I wear glasses. I have two (well three) pairs.

One is multifocal which I regularly wear. The second is monofocal which I wear in the woods because the multifocal make me dizzy with all the bushes and vines and because I can move my eyes to see a turkey rather than having to move my head. The third pair is monofocal and I use the half glasses for reading.

Just my experience...Geo

check your PM's

There is no free lunch in optics. I have had cataract surgery but had a conventional single focus intraocular lens installed. I would never do the multi-focal lens (I am an optical scientist but don't work in vision). Here is a link to one vendor of these devices:

https://www.aao.org/eyenet/article/when-to-use-multifocal-intraocular-lenses

OK, it works by combining refraction like a normal lens, and diffraction which is too hard to explain here. Diffractive surfaces are highly dispersive which means the focal length will change a lot with wavelength, and a diffractive lens is really only "perfect" at its design wavelength, which will probably be in the green for human vision. A single-glass lens also is only "perfect" at its design wavelength, but the dispersion is much less in the polymer they use for the lens. I would think there will be more scattering of light which (this is what diffraction does but not all of the light reaches the image plane to contribute to the image, it causes glare) means less light is available to form an image. In fact, from the URL I provided for one of the lens vendors "there is a greater chance of having significant halos (5 percent of all patients) or glare (5 percent) compared with a monofocal lens (1 percent) and 2 percent, respectively. The halos or glare were severe enough that in studies conducted for Alcon by independent consultants 0.5 percent of patients requested that their ReStor IOL be removed. Another side effect of the ReStor IOL�s complex optics is increased adjustment time compared with a monofocal IOL."

Any time you make a lens do more, it performs less optimally than a simple lens. Think zoom lens for a camera. Convenient, right? Well, they are crappy optically compared to a single focal length lens but they are "good enough" for what most people use them for. You just design to spread the pain over the range of focal lengths of the zoom lens. It's a compromise.

Ask your dr about the side effects above and make sure he knows your desires re: your shooting hobby. I don't think they will recommend the multi-focal lens.

Bruce

Good luck Buzz.

I had my eyes done a number of years ago and didn't have the option.
My eyes are better now than they were for many, many years. I wear glasses mainly for reading and also for safety. The glasses protect me from wind, dust and who knows what.
I'm sure your procedure will go well and you won't believe how well you can see. I wasn't able to see he long targets at sporting clays but I sure can now.

I had my cataract surgery done by my shooting pardner. They set me up to see skeet targets perfectly! The lens corrected my near sightness and astigmatism. Because I have worn glasses sense third grade, now 77, I feel very normal with bifocals in plain lenses.

bill

I unexpectedly had to have both eyes done last year. It was unexpected because I was only 44 and had never had need for corrective lenses of any type. Vision was perfect in the beginning of the year and by Labor Day, it was horrible.

I spent a lot of time researching my options and settled on the the single focal lenses for distance. I was willing to spend the extra money for the multi focal lenses but ultimately decided there was too great a chance of detriment for little possible gain. At my final check, I was 20/20 in my left eye and 20/15 in my right. A year after the first surgery, I have no regrets about my choice. I use cheaters (+1.25) for reading and anything I need to see extreme detail on at three feet and closer for work but I can see 1/8" tall print sharply at four feet. It's only the first few feet that aren't quite as clear when they say "distance" lens.

Best of luck with your surgery Buzz. Hope it goes well for you (it will). The surgery is life changing.

My spousal unit had her eyes done last year, in two separate surgeries. She has always been farsighted but only needed cheaters the last few years for close work. She still needs the cheaters but is back to a tick better than 20/20 at distance and other artifacts (glare, halos) are gone. She went with monofocals based on the surgeon's advice and she is pleased. I'll probably go the same way, but I'm putting it off, even though I can't see ducks early in the morning. Hunted twice this week and I really notice the degradation from just a couple of years ago, compared to the younger guys I hunt with.

I have the beginning of cataracts but won't need surgery for several years.

I do have what are termed "floaters", congealed protein masses in the eyeball's fluid which can come into my field of vision at inopportune times, such as shooting. I get a small blur right in the center of my field of view.

In a casual conversation I was recently told by an eye surgeon that cataract surgery will often relieve the symptoms of floaters since, during surgery, the aqueous humor is replaced with synthetic fluid.

Anyone have experience with this after cataract surgery?


thanks,

Rob