According to a leading researcher in the ophthalmic industry, there are greater than 17 million people around the world who have had undergone LASIK or any other laser assisted refractive surgery. Approximately eight million of these laser procedures for correcting defects in vision have actually been conducted in the United States.
In the United States, the number of laser operations as a corrective procedure for defective vision has been maintained or very little change occurred. Thus, the number of cases per year has remained unchanged throughout the years.
An estimated population of 1.3 million operations has been performed per year from 2004 to 2006. Also, it has been approximated that more than 1.3 million of corrective operations have taken place in the year of 2007. These figures are expected to continue and to mark up in the present year of 2008.
Statistics According to Demography
Corrective procedures for defective eyesight have been conducted on several individuals over the past years. It has been established that a slightly higher population of males with a percentage of about 54% undergo refractive operations. As for the percentage of females undergoing the procedure, it is slightly lower with only 46%. These percentages of performed operations between males and females have a very narrow difference.
In terms of age, the corrective surgeries are commonly performed to those who belong to the age bracket of relatively younger population. Patients are commonly between ages 18 to 34.
Shocking Discovery
According to surveys conducted by Vision Watch for a period of six months that ended in December, it was found out that only around 57 percent of the consumers and respondents have knowledge of eye operations. They verbalized their awareness regarding LASIK. These are surgeries that are made available for those who have been experiencing a problem in their eyesight.
The results of the survey show that there is still an estimate of 43 percent of the population who has no knowledge of the present technological developments with regards to eye care and vision correction. Some expressed that they do not know anything at all about these processes and some others stated that they know very little regarding these techniques. A number of those interviewed were even surprised to know that there are actually several types to choose from when considering refractive surgery as a means of correcting an individual’s defective eyesight.
Obstacles Encountered by LASIK Technology
Yet again, even with an awareness of refractive procedures there are those who are apprehensive in undergoing the process. Most have actually said that they are in fact waiting for a technologically advanced method. This must be due to the little information they have and results to fear. This is where the issue of safety comes in.
At times coming across horrible anecdotes about the results of an unsuccessful LASIK operation deters many people from seriously contemplating the choice. There exists a much greater population of patients who have come out of the operation without any complications at all. Despite this, many people are apprehensive since not all success stories are being told through a casual conversation among many people. Contrary to that, many of those patients with unsuccessful stories would really go out of their way to give a detailed account.
Statistics According to Type
LASIK operations may actually be wonderful and life changing experiences for those people whose eyesight is not so ideal. Nowadays, a number of refractive surgeries are made available to the public. The wide variety of techniques will help ease apprehensions of the process. There is still the original type that has been well documented down to LASIK procedures conducted with the three dimensional wavefront technology and the method that employs lasers entirely.
The existing popularity of each type of refractive surgeries have been looked into. According to the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, about 50 percent of the cases of patients in the United States were treated with the use of wave front guided process.
Another 25 percent of the LASIK operations that have been performed were through the Intralase technology. It is the type of LASIK that uses an all-laser technique rather than the use of blades called microkeratomes and is able to create a corneal flap in a matter of seconds. Since its release many people have been interested in this.
