What can LASIK not fix?

Lots of things related to vision cannot be fixed with LASIK. Disease and degenerations like macular degeneration and cataracts are not at all suited for LASIK treatment.

In the world of vision problems that glasses can correct (which is really what refractive surgery like LASIK is meant to treat), LASIK does not treat presbyopia (the farsightedness of middle age).

The real purpose of LASIK is to fix visual problems of distance vision: myopia (nearsightedness) and astigmatism. But even within this limited category, LASIK is best for low to moderate degrees of nearsightedness, not the very high and severe kinds.

LASIK was so successful and popular that the public came to think: LASIK = the surgery that fixes your vision problems forever. That is not at all the case!

_Written by J. Trevor Woodhams, M.D. - Chief of Surgery, Woodhams Eye Clinic