Question:
I had cataract surgery on my right eye on 11/12. 2.5 weeks afterwords,
I tested 20/40. Everything that was in focus was VERY clear. On 12/2
I had the left eye done, but things are not tack sharp at any distance.
Also, evenly lighted surfaces viewed through the right eye are a bit
brighter than when viewed through the left one.
I'm going to the doctor this coming week, but I would appreciate
comments from people on the group as to why my post-operative experience
is so different. Franky, I'm a bit worried about it. Has anybody else
had a similar post-op experience?
Answer:
One possibility is that the IOL overcorrected and you are now far
sighted by over a diopter. You could check that by going to a local
drugstore that sells ready made reading glasses and trying a variety of
diopter lenses to see if any brings things into adequate focus at some
distance.
Another possiblity is that you had a lot of astigmatism in that eye
before the surgery and it is still there. The surgeon places the
incision so as to reduce the astigmatism if possible, but the results
are variable. I guess it is also possible that the surgery can add
astigmatism which wasn't there before. I have over 1 diopter residual
astimatism in one eye and I definitely don't see things as clearly with
that eye without correction as I do with the other eye. After
correction, it is fine. The only way to test that is for your doctor to
do a refraction.
The only other relatively common problem I know about is macular edema.
It sometimes happens after cataract surgery that the small area which
does most of the work in vision, called the macula, swells up a bit. It
doesn't indicate that the surgeon messed up. It can be treated with
anti-inflammatory drops, and it almost always clears up in a few weeks
or so. That happened to me. Initially I saw quite well in that eye,
but by about one week, it had deteriorated significantly. At my one
week appointment, the technician couldn't correct it to better than
20/40. Also, I noticed that if I looked straight at a vertical line,
right in the center there was a jagged area.
