Not a LASIK Candidate?  No Worries.

 

 

Those who are ideal candidates for a procedure have great outcomes.  Unfortunately, not everyone who wants to have LASIK is a great candidate.  If you already know you're not a candidate for LASIK don't be discouraged.  There are still lots of safe and effective options available to you such as PRK, Visian ICL, CLR and others.  In this section of the website you can explore the alternatives that may be available to you.  Surprisingly, how good a candidate you are for a given procedure may actually vary from doctor to doctor (read below).  That's why we urge you to come in for a consultation and learn what's best for you.

 

As with anything in life, there are a few absolutes.  

 

Here are some of the absolute contraindications to having LASIK:

 

 

Here are some non-absolute or relative considerations:

 

 

Every patient is unique and comes with a set of expectations, conditions, desires, and, of course, measurements.  The combination of all these factors will determine the candidacy of each patient.  Surprisingly this is not just patient, but doctor dependent as well.  Since most doctors are human, each has his or her own philosophy, training, experience, skill set, available technology, that will affect what procedures they are comfortable offering for a given patient.

 

Being told that you are a "great" candidate by one surgeon, does not mean you will be perceived the same way by another.  

 

If a surgeon is most comfortable performing LASIK, then he may extend the range of patients that he will treat with that procedure.  Surgeons who are equally expert in LASIK, PRK, ICL, Lens Exchange may be less likely to recommend a certain procedure when the patient is at the fringe of being an ideal candidate.

 

To summarize, a patient's candidacy for a given procedure depends on a number of patient and doctor related factors.  Some factors are absolute while others are relative.

 

Determining  someone's candidacy for the procedure depends on a number of factors some objective and some subjective, some absolute and others relative.  

 

Because having refractive surgery is a decision that you will have to live with for the rest of your life, we strongly recommend that you are comfortable making it.