Laser Eye Surgery

The laser used, an excimer laser, is a computer-controlled ultraviolet beam of light.

It burns cool so as not to heat up and damage the surrounding eye tissue.

Corneal incision procedures such as radial keratotomy and arcuate keratotomy use miniscule incisions in the cornea to alter its surface and correct refractive errors.

Radial keratotomy, or RK, uses a diamond tipped knife to make a number of spoke-shaped incisions in the cornea.

The result of the incisions is that the cornea flattens out, minimizing the effects of myopia.

Arcuate keratotomy, or AK, is very similar to RK.

The diamond knife is used to cut incisions that are parallel to the edge of the cornea, as opposed to the spoke-shaped incisions of the RK procedure.

These procedures have been much less common with the emergence of laser-assisted refractive eye surgeries.

Thermal procedures use heat to correct temporarily hyperopic refractive errors, or farsightedness.

The thermal keratoplasty procedure involves putting a ring of 8 or 16 small burns on the eye immediately surrounding the pupil.

The application of the heat increases the slope of the cornea, making it steeper, through thermal contractions.

There are two main types of thermal keratoplasty.

Laser Thermal Keratoplasty, or LTK, is a no-touch procedure that uses a holmium las...

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