To date, laser eye surgery has treated over 5 million people worldwide and these numbers are continually growing. Laser eye surgery can correct all types of visual error including long sightedness, short sightedness and astigmatism and the treatable prescription range is extremely large. Laser eye surgery works by reshaping the surface of your eye (cornea) in such a way as to eliminate the prescription in your glasses / contact lenses. As to whether you can have laser eye surgery during pregnancy then the simple answer to this is no. The following explains the reasons why this is the case:
Hormonal changes affect your vision: During pregnancy there is a significant change in both the type and amount of hormones in your body and these can often affect the prescription in your glasses. This could result in your laser eye surgery correction being inaccurate and short lasting. If for example before you were pregnant your prescription was -4.00 but during pregnancy your prescription changed to -3.00. If you went for a laser eye surgery consultation whilst pregnant your surgeon would measure your prescription to be -3.00. Your surgeon would therefore correct your prescription to reflect this and initially your vision would be perfect. If following pregnancy as is often the case, your prescription returns back to what it was previously then you would still have a prescription of -1.00 and would unfortunately need to wear glasses. This of course would be a waste of your hard earned money!
Hormonal changes can cause dry eyes: Women often find that their eyes can ‘dry out’ during pregnancy which is not ideal for laser eye surgery. The components of the tears can be influenced by changing hormones which affects their performance. Dry eyes will make the laser eye surgery recovery period longer and more uncomfortable and some surgeons will not perform the procedure if you have dry eyes.
Breastfeeding: During breastfeeding there are similar hormone changes as there is during pregnancy and consequently the same two issues as above also apply. In addition to this, the eye drops that are prescribed following laser eye surgery can theoretically enter your circulation and pass to the baby whilst feeding. Although the chances of this happening are low, it is still not worth taking the risk with your new born baby. It is therefore advisable not to have laser eye surgery whilst breast feeding and most surgeons will advise waiting at least 3 months from cessation before you consider going ahead with the treatment.
As you can see having laser eye surgery whilst pregnant or breast feeding is not recommended. The same also applies if you are planning on getting pregnant in the near future as it is always difficult to predict how your prescription will changes as a result of the hormonal changes. Not all pregnant women will find their vision changes during pregnancy but it is impossible to predict how you will be affected. There is no point having laser eye surgery if your surgeon cannot be 100% certain that your prescription is stable and unfortunately this is not the case with pregnancy
This article was provided by Tim, an Optometrist with over 10 years’ experience in the field of laser eye surgery. Tim also writes for his own website Treatmentsaver which covers a range of topics from laser eye surgery cost to laser eye surgery risks. The most important thing when considering the treatment is to ensure that you are fully informed about every aspect of the procedure.