The necessity of reading glasses over 45 years of age is caused by Presbyopia, it's like fighting the tide, inevitably everyone will need reading glasses. Most people find this unwanted onset of fuzzy near vision a huge inconvenience and the need to take reading glasses everywhere even more so. It's an indicator of age and the desire to avoid it is enormous.
Historically the treatment to remove the need for reading glasses was less than ideal. Laser vision correction alone can only fix for one distance range and for that reason for patients over 45 years of age the choice has been to either correct both eyes for distance vision and wear reading glasses, or a technique called monovision, in which one eye is fixed for distance vision and the other eye for near vision.
The drawback of the monovision procedure is the fact that having one of your eyes for distance vision and the other for near vision doesn't allow for fine depth perception, or 'stereopsis'. The human visual pathway has evolved specifically to give us fine depth perception and the losing this is quite a sacrifice.
The monovision technique also allows us to read because of one eye being shortsighted, and the refraction this causes creates a near point of focus. The unfortunate downside to this is the obligation for reading glasses gets more intense as you grow older, and generally within 10 years monovision will be insufficient to allow decent reading and will need to have future enhancement. This fact often leads to the popular misbelief that LASIK only lasts ten years. Rather, distance correction should last for the rest of your life; it's only the reading ability that tends to degrade as time goes on.
The Kamra inlay is a novel new technology that overcomes a lot of the problems of conventional attempts to attain independence of reading spectacles along the lines of monovision. It is a small (3.8 mm diameter) black donut containing a middle 1.6 mm aperture which is just 5 microns thick. That's actually thinner than a single cell on the corneal surface. It is employed in conjunction with a Blade-free or femtosecond laser eye surgery operation and is inserted in the bed of the created flap at the conclusion of the case in only the non-dominant eye.
The basic precept is that a shortened aperture to look through boosts the degree of focus, allowing the fullest range of vision from distance, intermediate, and all the way to the littlest line of print for near. It's a similar principle to that found in photography where a shortened aperture improves the depth of focus in a photo meaning things seen simultaneously in the background and in the foreground are experienced with sharpness.
The benefit of the procedure is multiple:
- You can continue to keep the two eyes seeing clearly for long distance and as a result maintain the crucial enjoyment of depth perception that's unfortunately lost with monovision operations.
- As opposed to the isolated near sweet spot observed in monovision procedures, an individual with a Kamra inlay has an total range of vision from distance entirely to near with all the things in the middle also in sharp focus.
- The improved depth of focus that is gained is sufficient to cover you over your whole lifetime regardless of the strength of eyeglasses that might have been required at that age and accordingly you may well sustain freedom from reading glasses for the duration of your life without needing to have anything else done.
- It delivers great reassurance to individuals getting the treatment that it is completely reversible.
- Even individuals with an ordinary monofocal lens after a cataract extraction procedure would have the opportunity to read with a Kamra inlay in without all the hurdles encountered with multi-focal intraocular lenses such as viewing halos around bright lights.
- Folks who have already had LASIK operations in the past can still get the Kamra inlay put in as a supplementary procedure when they begin to require reading glasses.
- Men and women who already have acceptable distance vision and only require reading glasses are the most suitable candidates for the Kamra inlay, as unlike with monovision in the past, now they don't need to sacrifice their distance vision quality to acquire their aim of doing away with the readers.
The substantial demand from the forty somethings and beyond to attain escape from reading glasses will allow for the exciting step forward the Kamra inlay represents to make a tremendous impact in the field of vision correction; the Kamra - the tiny revolution!
Historically the treatment to remove the need for reading glasses was less than ideal. Laser vision correction alone can only fix for one distance range and for that reason for patients over 45 years of age the choice has been to either correct both eyes for distance vision and wear reading glasses, or a technique called monovision, in which one eye is fixed for distance vision and the other eye for near vision.
The drawback of the monovision procedure is the fact that having one of your eyes for distance vision and the other for near vision doesn't allow for fine depth perception, or 'stereopsis'. The human visual pathway has evolved specifically to give us fine depth perception and the losing this is quite a sacrifice.
The monovision technique also allows us to read because of one eye being shortsighted, and the refraction this causes creates a near point of focus. The unfortunate downside to this is the obligation for reading glasses gets more intense as you grow older, and generally within 10 years monovision will be insufficient to allow decent reading and will need to have future enhancement. This fact often leads to the popular misbelief that LASIK only lasts ten years. Rather, distance correction should last for the rest of your life; it's only the reading ability that tends to degrade as time goes on.
The Kamra inlay is a novel new technology that overcomes a lot of the problems of conventional attempts to attain independence of reading spectacles along the lines of monovision. It is a small (3.8 mm diameter) black donut containing a middle 1.6 mm aperture which is just 5 microns thick. That's actually thinner than a single cell on the corneal surface. It is employed in conjunction with a Blade-free or femtosecond laser eye surgery operation and is inserted in the bed of the created flap at the conclusion of the case in only the non-dominant eye.
The basic precept is that a shortened aperture to look through boosts the degree of focus, allowing the fullest range of vision from distance, intermediate, and all the way to the littlest line of print for near. It's a similar principle to that found in photography where a shortened aperture improves the depth of focus in a photo meaning things seen simultaneously in the background and in the foreground are experienced with sharpness.
The benefit of the procedure is multiple:
- You can continue to keep the two eyes seeing clearly for long distance and as a result maintain the crucial enjoyment of depth perception that's unfortunately lost with monovision operations.
- As opposed to the isolated near sweet spot observed in monovision procedures, an individual with a Kamra inlay has an total range of vision from distance entirely to near with all the things in the middle also in sharp focus.
- The improved depth of focus that is gained is sufficient to cover you over your whole lifetime regardless of the strength of eyeglasses that might have been required at that age and accordingly you may well sustain freedom from reading glasses for the duration of your life without needing to have anything else done.
- It delivers great reassurance to individuals getting the treatment that it is completely reversible.
- Even individuals with an ordinary monofocal lens after a cataract extraction procedure would have the opportunity to read with a Kamra inlay in without all the hurdles encountered with multi-focal intraocular lenses such as viewing halos around bright lights.
- Folks who have already had LASIK operations in the past can still get the Kamra inlay put in as a supplementary procedure when they begin to require reading glasses.
- Men and women who already have acceptable distance vision and only require reading glasses are the most suitable candidates for the Kamra inlay, as unlike with monovision in the past, now they don't need to sacrifice their distance vision quality to acquire their aim of doing away with the readers.
The substantial demand from the forty somethings and beyond to attain escape from reading glasses will allow for the exciting step forward the Kamra inlay represents to make a tremendous impact in the field of vision correction; the Kamra - the tiny revolution!
About the Author:
Dr. James Genge is a trusted and accomplished ophthalmologist from Sydney Australia. Want to learn more about the Kamra inlay? Visit his website at Laser Eye Surgery Sydney.
