Presbyopia is the requirement for reading glasses over the age of 45, it can be like battling the tide, ultimately most people will need reading glasses. A good number of people find this onset of blurry near sight a huge aggravation and the need to have reading glasses just about everywhere even more so. It’s a symptom of ageing and the desire to avoid it is enormous.
Frequently the solution to remove the need for reading glasses has been certainly not ideal. Laser vision correction alone can correct only for one distance range and for that reason for individuals over the age of 45 the only options have been to either correct both eyes for distance vision and wear reading glasses, or a procedure called monovision, in which one of the eyes is fixed for distance vision and the other eye for near vision.
The problem with the monovision technique is the fact that using one of your eyes for distance vision and the other for near vision won’t provide for stereopsis, which is fine depth perception. The human visual pathway has evolved specifically to give us fine depth perception and the having this taken away is a significant sacrifice.
The monovision procedure also allows us to read by making one eye shortsighted and the refraction this causes gives us a near focal point. Unfortunately, the difficulty with this is the prerequisite for reading glasses gets stronger as you age, and commonly within 10 years a monovision correction will not be sufficient to allow decent reading and will need future improvement. This fact often leads to the common false impression that LASIK lasts only a decade. In truth, distance correction should last for the rest of your life; it is primarily the reading ability which will deteriorate as time progresses.
To overcome a lot of the problems of typical endeavours to attain freedom from reading eyeglasses like monovision, there is a revolutionary cutting edge technique called the Kamra Inlay. It’s tiny, at only 3.8mm diameter, black donut containing a middle 1.6 mm aperture which is merely 5 microns thick. That is actually thinner than a single cell on the corneal surface. It is used along with a Blade-free or femtosecond laser vision correction treatment and is positioned in the base of the created flap at the end of the case in only the non-dominant eye.
The basic precept is that a lessened aperture to look through boosts the range of focus, allowing a full spectrum of vision from distance, intermediate, and all the way up to the smallest line of print for near. It’s a comparable concept to the one observed in photography where a lessened aperture increases the focal depth in the picture which means objects seen both in the distance and in the foreground are observed with sharp relief.
There are numerous advantages
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- You can preserve both eyes seeing effectively for distance and hence continue to keep the critical enjoyment of depth perception which can be unfortunately sacrificed with monovision techniques.
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- As opposed to the isolated near sweet spot experienced in monovision procedures, a person with a Kamra inlay has an whole spectrum of vision from distance entirely to near with everything in between also in sharp focus.
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- The superior depth of focus that is achieved is sufficient to last for your whole life regardless of the strength of spectacles that would have been required at that age and consequently you can retain independence from reading glasses for life without needing to get any other procedures done.
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- It delivers great comfort to individuals having the procedure that it is fully reversible.
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- Even patients with a conventional monofocal lens after a cataract extraction procedure would have the opportunity to read with a Kamra inlay in minus all the downfalls come across with multi-focal intraocular lenses such as viewing ‘halos’ around bright lights.
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- People who have already had laser vision correction procedures in the past can still get the Kamra inlay put in as a supplementary treatment when they begin to need eyeglasses.
- People who already have decent long distance vision and only require reading glasses are the ideally suited candidates for the Kamra inlay, as contrary to the monovision procedure in the past, now they don’t need to sacrifice the quality of their distance vision to achieve their goal of eradicating the eyeglasses.
The huge requirement from the forty somethings and beyond to accomplish independence from reading glasses will allow for the remarkable step forward the Kamra inlay delivers to make a huge impact in the field of vision correction; the Kamra – a tiny revolution!
Dr. James Genge is a trusted eye surgeon and ophthalmologist from Sydney Australia. Learn more about the Kamra Inlay and other eye health issues at his website, Laser Eye Surgery Sydney.