When was first laser eye surgery

He theorized the radial cuts flattened the cornea. Although a Japanese surgeon had already attempted refractive surgery by making incisions from within the eye, Fyodorov developed radial keratotomy by calculating how to make radial incisions on the anterior surface of the cornea to change its shape. His colleagues did not share his enthusiasm at first. Despite opposition, Fyodorov pushed forward with radial keratotomy.

Wynne — had been exploring new ways to use the excimer laser that had been recently acquired by their laser physics and chemistry group. Blum was an expert in materials science; Srinivasan was a photochemist with 21 US patents to his name; and Wynne was a physicist, who was the manager of the group at IBM. The excimer laser uses reactive gases, such as chlorine and fluorine, mixed with inert gases, such as argon, krypton and xenon.

When electrically excited, the gas mixture emits energetic pulses of ultraviolet light, which can make very precise, minute changes to irradiated material, such as polymers. Trokel, Srinivasan, and Braren wrote a paper introducing the idea of using the laser to reshape or sculpt the cornea the clear covering on the front of the eye in order to correct refractive errors, such as myopia or hyperopia.

Their paper, published in a major ophthalmology journal in December , launched a worldwide program of research to develop excimer laser-based refractive surgery. The next ten years were spent perfecting the equipment and the techniques used in laser eye surgery.

In , the first Excimer laser for ophthalmic refractive use was approved in the United States. Stephen Slade and his scientific colleague, Dr. With the development of precise surgical cutting instruments, the use of the excimer laser could be combined with an incision to produce a particular surgical result. It has become, by far, the most commonly performed refractive surgery procedure used today. The corneal flap is lifted up, and the excimer laser beam is applied to the exposed interior surface of the cornea to reshape the tissue.

The flap is then replaced over the treated area. This corneal flap serves a natural bandage, which eliminates the discomfort associated with other types of refractive surgery, and expedites the healing process. Because of the extraordinary bonding properties of the corneal tissue, stitches are not needed to keep the flap in place after LASIK surgery.

Photorefractive keratectomy, or PRK, was the first kind of corrective eye surgery to use a laser rather than a blade to remove corneal tissue. Building on this theory Dr Jose Barraquer as far back as the late s proposed that refractive errors such as myopia and hypermetropia could be corrected by modifying the shape of the cornea. Our laser eye and cataract surgeon Mr Romesh Angunawela providing information on who invented laser eye surgery. Around the same time, a Japanese Ophthalmologist Tsutomu Tsato first practised refractive surgery on war pilots making incisions to the cornea radially which improved their vision but later resulted in corneal degradation.

Barraquer continued developing the stromal sculpting method at his clinic in Bogota during the s which evolved into modern-day Lasik. Dr Svyyatoslav Fyodorov, a Russian ophthalmologist went on to develop radial keratotomy in the s, an eye surgery procedure which was designed to flatten the cornea by making cuts which followed a radial pattern.

The event that led to this procedure being developed came about when a patient he had been seeing for correction of myopia caused by astigmatism, had an accident during which glass particles became lodged in both his eyes. RK enjoyed great popularity during the s and was one of the most studied refractive surgical procedures, but it was not without complications and problems.

Indeed, surgeons found it difficult to make an incision of an accurate size and depth that would give reliably predictable results. More improvements were still needed. Developments in the field of lasers propelled vision correction into a new arena. Light from a laser is tuned to specific wavelengths which allow the light to be focussed into powerful beams. These beams are so intense that they are able to precisely cut industrial-grade steel and shape diamonds.

Studies in the s with diatomic molecules and noble gases led to the invention of a laser called the excimer laser. To do this, Barraquerr removed a layer of the cornea, froze it to reshape it, and then re-implanted it.

Fyodorov saw a young short-sighted boy who had corneal damage caused by fragments of glass. Fydorov suspected that the cuts to the cornea had actually flattened it, leading to better vision, and used this knowledge to develop a technique called radial keratotomy. The Excimer Laser was developed and worked on over a period of 10 years from Three researchers named Samuel Blum, Rangaswamy Srinivasan and James Wynne discovered new ways to use the laser which relied on reactive gases mixed with inert gases.

If they charged the laser electrically, it emitted pulses of UV light, allowing them to make tiny, extremely precise changes to materials. A surgical cutting instrument was used to make precise incisions all around the edge of the cornea, creating a flap. The flap is then replaced, sealing naturally back onto the eye. This method of laser eye surgery was much more accurate and produced even better results.

Our chairman, Russell Ambrose, founded the company 30 years ago this year, and we have performed more than , vision correction procedures over the years! Russell was actually the first Optimax patient to receive treatment and, thanks to monovision treatment a couple of decades later to correct the need for reading glasses , he enjoys glasses-free vision today in his seventies.

This is because of the Femtosecond laser which was developed between the years of and , before being approved for use on patients.