Anthony asked:

Hi Dave
I am 67 years old and currently use daily contacts. Left eye D + 1.50 Right D + 1.75, the left eye has a slight astigmatisum. I use + 2 reading glasses. I have been told that due to some mild furring around the edges of the cornea, expected at my age, I will need Intra – Ocular Lenses, one for long distance and one for reading. Also I have some dryness in both eyes, again expected at my age.
Do you think I am too old and would Z-Lasik be able to correct my vision in both distance and reading or just distance. I live in London so travelling to Wimpole Street is not a problem should I decide to have a consultation.

My reply was:
Hi Anthony, Certainly not too old, and I have done blended vision for patients in their 70s. All depends on the condition of your natural lenses and presence of any cataracts. Sometimes IOLs can be the better choice but not always. Your prescription is certainly in range of those I treat for correcting distance and near. Dryness can be assessed and treated if not too bad. If severe, would likely be a block to laser eye correction, but not to IOLs.

We can certainly have a look at consultation with one of my team as a first step. Price wise, the IOLs are the more expensive option, at £2,500-3,000 per eye, the latter being if you opt for multifocal lenses to help with reading and distance. Laser blended vision is £2,200 per eye, again correcting far and near.

Nicholas asked:

Hi Dave, my wife had a consultation about having a laser treatment, because she got fed up of wearing varifocal glasses. She was told that she will still have to wear reading glasses, although they will perform the wavefront laser technique. Her age is 55. They said over the age of 45 you might still need reading glasses. What is your opinion on this please?

Hi Nicholas, LASIK blended vision can correct both distance and near vision, and so reduce or eliminate the need for reading glasses. I know of only two clinics that specifically offer LASIK blended vision. Expect to pay around £2000-2300 per eye. If you only want distance corrected, all laser clinics will offer that.

Gill asked this question about laser eye surgery for varifocal and reading glasses:

Dear Mr Allamby, I was told last year by my optician I would benefit from varifocal lenses, which I hate. My prescription was:
R: Plano (zero) /-2.75 x 180
L: Plano (zero) /-1.25 x 175
Near Add: +1.50D
I am 51 years old. I had a consultation for corrective surgery and told I only need right eye done. Is this correct and how much would this be likely to cost at Focus? Thank you, (brilliant and most helpful blog by the way)
Gill

Hi Gill, You have myopic (short-sighted) astigmatism, with mild astigmatism in the left eye and a moderately higher amount in the right. Additionally, at age 51 you also have presbyopia, which is an age related loss of near vision (itself a form of long-sight). So you have three eye conditions together – myopia, astigmatism and presbyopia, which all need correcting (!) if you want to be pretty independent of glasses. However, correction is certainly possible.

I specialise in correcting these kind of prescriptions, over the last 7-8 years, and have done thousands of cases. I would need to assess which is the dominant eye and correct that eye fully. However, contrary to what the other clinic said, leaving astigmatism in the eye which is to read rarely is successful. So with your prescription I almost always treat both eyes. Of course, everything depends on what we find at the consultation, but this will give you a strong idea of what you likely need.

I charge just under £4,000 for both eyes for wavefront Ziemer Z-LASIK. If you want me personally to do your initial consultation rather than one of my team, add £200. The blended vision presbyopia treatments will be increasing soon, likely to £4,400 for both eyes.

Hope that helps explain somewhat Gill. If you post on the comments below, your reply will also come to me.

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