Eyeworld

EW FEATURE 54 Refractive surgery in military personnel and first responders • July 2016 by EyeWorld staff I n 2015, ASCRS members were surveyed about their refractive surgical practices. According to Steve Schallhorn, MD, San Di- ego, there are some differences between surgeons in private practice and military surgeons. "The military does a much higher percentage of PRK than the civilian community. This is due to the historical concern about flap displacement (especially using a mechanical keratome) and patient/surgeon preference," he explained. In the 2015 ASCRS Clinical Survey, ASCRS members were asked about their average annual volume of laser vision correction surgery. The current average is 145 eyes, with those outside the U.S. averaging more (165) than U.S. surgeons (130). Forty-six percent of respondents don't do any laser vision correction, but 25% of those who don't cur- rently perform it plan to offer laser vision correction in the next 12 months. Surgeons were also asked what percentage of their laser vision cor- rection procedures involves surface ASCRS members weigh in on procedures including PRK, the widely used choice for refractive surgery in the military Refractive surgical practices Figure 1: Respondents to the 2015 ASCRS Clinical Survey reported performing laser vision correction surgery on an average of 145 eyes annually. Figure 2: Respondents reported an average of 24% of their laser vision correction procedures involve surface ablation, either PRK or LASEK. Figure 3: 81% of U.S. respondents reported using wavefront ablations (customized or optimized) in their corneal refractive procedures. Figure 4: In 2 to 3 years, 79% of U.S. respondents reported they will use wavefront- customized or wavefront-optimized ablations. Respondents reported an increase in both topography-customized and femtosecond intrastromal lenticular extraction compared to the current reported use. continued on page 56

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