Laser Cataract Surgery
EXCITING NEW TECHNOLOGY, NOW AVAILABLE AT GORDON EYE SURGERY!
Gordon Eye Surgery’s Associate Professor Geoffrey Painter, Dr Sara Booth-Mason and Dr John Grigg have worked with Dalcross Adventist Hospital, and have undergone training in Australia and the USA, to make this new technology available to our patients requiring cataract surgery.
Gordon Eye Surgery now has access to state-of-the-art new technology enabling blade-free incisions to cut tissues with a precision that manual techniques struggle to match. Using computer-guided Femtosecond laser, this technique is now able to perform the early stages of cataract surgery.
What is laser assisted cataract surgery?
Cataract surgery is one of the most common operations performed worldwide and through extensive development and technological advances has also become one of the safest and most successful operations that exists in modern medicine.
Until the early 1990’s it was an entirely manual procedure with the natural lens removed through a large incision, which was then sutured following intraocular lens (IOL) implantation.
In the 1990’s phacoemulsification technology was introduced to Australia, where the cataract was removed mechanically through a small incision, using an ultrasound driven probe, with the implantation of a foldable IOL. Over the last 20 years improvements in phacoemulsification machines, along with IOL materials and designs, have seen a refinement in the procedure resulting in the high quality surgery that is now commonplace in Australia. However, despite these advances, and even in the best of hands, there has still been a degree of variability in outcomes which it is desirable to reduce further.
Cataract surgery in Australia took another significant step forward in its evolution in August 2011 with the arrival at Dalcross Adventist Hospital (DAH) of the Alcon LenSx Femtosecond Laser for cataract surgery.This exciting new technology uses a computer guided Femtosecond laser to perform the early stages of the cataract operation, enabling blade-freecataract surgery that cuts the tissues with a degree of precision that manual techniques struggle to match.
Femtosecond laser technology has already been well proven in Refractive Laser Eye Surgery for nearly 10 years with well over 1 million procedures preformed to date.
The LenSx Femtosecond Laser is based on this technology and is the first available in Australia with FDA and TGA approval for cataract surgery.
What are the advantages of Laser Assisted Cataract Surgery?
Results from early clinical studies in the USA and Europe already indicate the benefits of the technology in a number of areas:
- Reproducability and strength of the Laser Capsulotomy (the opening in the front of the lens)
- More precise and potentially safer wounds in the front of the eye.
- Lens division by laser it is felt, will deliver less invasive surgery and less damage to the endothelium (the delicate inner layer of the cornea) leading to quicker visual recovery
Laser Assisted Cataract Surgery has the promise to be the next evolution in cataract surgery with improved visual outcomes, quicker recovery, better control of astigmatism (distortion of the front of the eye) and improved safety. These are goals both surgeons and patients will value and with further clinical research this technology could become the next gold standard for cataract surgery.
For more information regarding procedure dates and costs, please contact the Surgical Coordinator on (02) 9932 6309 or by email.
What is the difference between the two techniques?
| Traditional Phacoemulsification | Laser Guided Cataract Extraction |
|---|---|
| Surgeon manually cuts the main and side port incisions with a blade | The Femtosecond laser cuts the incisions |
| Surgeon manually tears an opening in the front of the lens to gain access to the lens | The Femtosecond laser cuts the opening |
| Surgeon divides the lens manually with an ultrasonic probe | The Femtosecond laser divides the lens |
| Surgeon aspirates the lens with an ultrasonic probe and suction | Surgeon aspirates the lens with an ultrasonic probe and suction |
| Intraocular lens (IOL) is inserted by the surgeon | Intraocular lens (IOL) is inserted by the surgeon |
