Hello, this question have been posted several times but there is a turning point. In young patients the zonules (strings that keep the bag steady) are still very elastic and they can move making the bag and the iol inside the bag wobbling. That's why you perceive the flickering effect. Check on youtube "Alcon AcrySof IQ PanOptix IOL - Eye lens flickering after cataract surgery", there is a video about a woman with very obvious lens wobbling called pseudophacodonesis. Try to film your eyes and see if you can perceive this effect too. I did!
Thank you! I will check out the video you recommended. At 66, I am definitely no longer considered to be young. I have not had my surgery yet so I am not personally experiencing the flickering. Just researching in the hopes that I can possibly prevent it from occuring by utilizing a lens that does not have that as a side effect.
I’m 67 with Technis ZCB00 monofocals. I had some flickering after my left eye cataract surgery 3 months ago, but it went away after a few weeks. It was infrequent, only under certain lighting conditions, and I didn’t find it bothersome. I had my right eye cataract surgery 2 days ago and had some flickering while my eyes were still dilated, but nothing since.
Most current lenses, including the ZCB00, have squared edges to diminish or delay the possibility of PCO, but may be more prone to negative dysphotopsia. So far so good for me though.
Congrats on your 2nd eye surgery - sounds like it was a success.
Going under Sue.An2 (for some odd reason my Sue.An account was deactivated. ) I can log in but can’t post. Sad to lose all my threads.
Thank you for sharing your experience! I have read that there is less of this problem associated with the Technis lens so I wonder why more cataract surgeons use the Alcon. I’m calling my surgeon tomorrow to see if the Technis can possibly be used for my surgery. I’m glad to hear that all is going well for you.
Thanks, Su.An. The surgery itself wasn’t so pleasant. It started out being very painful. The surgeon had to stop and have more anesthesia administered. I was surprised to experience pain during both of my surgeries (the second was worse than the first) after hearing everywhere that the surgery is smooth sailing. I can usually withstand a bit of pain, but this was too much to hold still for. I guess either it takes more anesthesia than expected to do the trick for me or the anesthesiologist did a poor job administering the correct amount.
In any event, the results seem good so far. I originally aimed for near vision with my left eye, but ended up at -1.00 with -0.25 astigmatism according to a recent eye exam. So I targeted distance vision in my right eye. I don’t think I’m quite at plano, but the distance vision so far is pretty good. It’s only been 2 days though, and may settle differently after more time as my left eye did.
Oh so sorry to hear it was a painful procedure. Did they pour a vial numbing liquid in your eye or some other method? I have read that people do react differently but if there was an issue first surgery that should have been taken into account for 2nd surgery.
Hopefully better distance vision for 2nd and there won’t be much change from what you have - sounds like it’s providing what you need.
hopefully healing process not so painful.
I’m guessing the Alcon is used more extensively for any of the following reasons - it may be cheaper, it may be easier to inject, better marketing, or first-on-market. The Tecnis has a higher Abbe number (higher is better) and a lower index of refraction (lower is better) than the Alcon; however, I don’t know if there is a real world difference.
I actually might have gone with a Bausch & Lomb monofocal if it was offered by a nearby doctor. The Tecnis and Alcon provide a negative correction for spherical aberration (SA) to counter the average person’s positive SA level, while the B&L is neutral in this regard and so leaves the SA level remain uncorrected. What this is supposed to mean is that the Tecnis and Alcon would provide somewhat better visual acuity but the B&L would provide a somewhat greater depth of field. I was willing to sacrifice a little visual acuity for the larger depth of field. No glistenings with the B&L either.
However, I’m really happy so far with the Tecnis. The mini-monovision I’ve achieved has given me a good depth of field from around 18 inches out to distance. For extensive newspaper or book reading, it will be more comfortable for me to use readers.
The anesthesia was administered via arm tube. They also applied a numbing eye drop. Oh well, it’s over now so no worries.
The healing process is going great. All is clear, at least for now, and that’s particularly good since next week I’m going to Cancun for a week.
Enjoy the weather in Cancun. I am headed to Florida next week. Canadian winter has been particularly cold this year and I can’t wait to escape even for a week.
Glad all is going well for you.
I just spoke with my surgeon and he said I can do the Tecnis instead of the Alcon, if that is my preference. He didn’t deny that the Alcon has issues with glimmering and light reflection but he said that Tecnis has problems with shimmering and shadows. I guess there is not a perfect lens out there. I don’t know what the difference is between glistening and shimmering. Have you experienced the shadows? Now I am really confused and don’t know which way to go.
I’m not seeing any shadows or other effects at this time, although my right eye is still healing. I mentioned earlier that I had some initial flickering after my left eye surgery, which might be what your surgeon is calling shimmering. It went away after a few weeks.
The shadows he mentioned may be the dark arcs some see in the peripheral of their vision after cataract surgery. I think the conventional thought is that the dark arcs are shadows from the lens that occur when the pupil is larger than the lens. Because older patients generally have smaller pupils, this may happen more with younger patients.
Someone said in this forum a while back that the functional optic diameter of the Tecnis is about 5 mm, less than its 6mm total diameter, due to the peripheral ring design. I don’t know whether this is accurate or not, but if so, it could mean that the shadows might happen more with the Tecnis. I don’t see them though, and I would think most don’t or we would be seeing more complaints.
The Alcon has been shown to have a higher risk of glistenings, which are liquid filled microvacuoles that form within the lens, possibly affecting vision quality. For the Tecnis and Bausch & Lomb’s enVista monofocals, the low glistenings potential is considered to be non-significant. You can do a web search on Alcon and glistenings or any of the other IOL manufacturers for more information.
I’m pretty happy with my Tecnis lenses, although I am seeing a diagonal stretch of light from street lamps at night with my right eye. I’m only 3 days out from the surgery though, so I’ll see what happens after more time to heal.
I am not specifically writing about lens wobbling. I am writing about the caution for people planning to undergo cataract operation.
My sincere suggestion to those planning to undergo cataract operation is that they should keep a gap of at least 4-5 months between 2 surgeries. This would give them an idea of the suitability and acceptability of the iOLs to their body. Finally iOL is a foreign body which needs to be accepted by your body. I had undergone cataract surgeries in November and December 2018 and since then I am suffering from severe photophobia. I have become totally handicapped since the eyes are not able to face strong lights. Going out in sunlight is not possible. Internal lights also give eye pain. I am now 70 and prior to the surgery I was regularly able to drive long distances for the last 50 years. Several eye drops are being tried out but none has given a perceptible improvement. The dryness of eyes has reduced and is now at an acceptable level but its effect on photophobia is almost nil.
In hindsight (which will always be 6/6), I feel I should have waited for 4-5 months to get into the second cataract surgery which was not that urgent. After my first surgery, I drove about 250 km in a day, 18 days after my first operation. 4-5 months’ gap would have given me an idea of how suitable is the iOL to take an appropriate decision. Cataract surgeries do not seem to be that simple as it is projected. May be one out of 1000 persons lands into a problem but for him/her, success ratio of 99.9% cannot be a consolation since he/she lands 100% into the category of problem cases.
So I would suggest everyone to take adequate care while selecting the time of operation and the type of iOL when going to surgery.
Shrikant
Agree if cataract surgery not urgent always better to wait. If both eyes need it though not sure waiting 4 or 5 months would change anything.
In my case I waited 6 weeks to allow for healing and settling if the IOL.
But those 6 weeks were hard to adjust to. Went around with a lens poked out of my glasses. Took a week off work but still had to manage 5 weeks.
Some eyes are more sensitive to light than others. I have blue eyes and always have had to wear sunglasses driving or when outside - even in cloudy conditions.
Also remember with cataracts there is a film over your eyes - often giving everything a yellowish brown tint (very noticeable after my first surgery and I could compare the 2 eyes). Once cataract is removed everything is very bright. I wore sunglasses even inside for months. I am 18 months out now and although I don’t need sunglasses anymore inside my home or office I need them driving or when outside.
Have you tried purchasing a good pair of sunglasses to see if that would help any?
Thanks Sue An for the suggestions. My specs are from Hoya with all the technologies built in and I also have polarised sunglasses. For photophobia they say you should use orange glasses which I have not tried. I have tried brown sunglasses which help to some extent. My problem, however, is I still get a burning sensation in the eye inside house.
Your mail indicates that one must have a lot of patience and I will try to take note of that and not expect some immediate results.
Thank you so much once again.
Shrikant
Thank you so much Sue An for the suggestions. My specs are from Hoya with all the technologies built in and I also have dark polarised sunglasses. However, those do not help much. I understand that one must use orange glasses for photophobia problems. I have not tried that but I tried brown glasses which has helped to some extent.
I understand from your mail that one needs to have patience and cannot expect immediate results. I will keep that in mind and carry on.
Thanks a lot again for your suggestions.
Regards
Shrikant
I know it’s not easy - particularly with vision (crucial for all aspects of life). And you are right although stats are high this is a successful and routine surgery performed many times over if one falls in the 5% for them it feels like 100% failure.
Wondering if a cornea or retina specialist could take a second look to see if something else eye related going on: the tear film is often affected by the surgery perhaps dry eye is causing the issue to be more pronounced than it should.
Getting older and having to put up with things is very difficult. I had tinnitus come upon me a year ago after a flu. No cure I am told just have to live with it but all the same extremely annoying so I can relate to how you must be feeling.
Hoping with time or with help from a specialist you’ll find your answers. Goof luck to you.
Su.An - You mentioned that your first account was deactivated and you lost all of your threads. In case you didn’t know this, you can click on your name in one of your old posts and it will show you the threads (with links) you followed. Easy to click through and follow them again.
Would love that to work but I am not able to use same email address. For whatever reason that email is not allowed bow. I can log on to view everything but cannot like or comment on anything with a message saying account has been deactivated. So had to register with entirely different email.
I wonder if I delete that account if I can have access to that email address. But then I would lose view access. I still get people reaching out with a comment or question so I log out and log in under Sue.An2
Very frustrating to say the least. I tried contact us route and explained my situation but no reply back from moderator.
Thanks though for the suggestion. LOL maybe someone flagged me and want me gone for all I know.
I know you’re joking, but I’m sure no one would flag you. You’ve been nothing but kind and helpful in every post you’ve made. It must be some fluke in the system. I wonder if the same thing happened to nina234, who I believe later went by Lin 59 and Andi77.