It’s now almost 10 years since my last blog post about glasses after cataract surgery. Since the last time I wrote about this topic, I’ve had a number of people come to me for second opinion after having been recommended cataract surgery to get rid of their glasses.
Lens removal and replacement with an intraocular lens, in the absence of “visually significant” cataract, is usually referred to as refractive lens exchange. It’s essentially the same operation as routine cataract surgery, although the goal is different. Cataract surgery is surgery to remove cataract which is causing problems with vision and replace it with the synthetic lens. Achieving glasses independence is an added bonus to the procedure. In refractive lens exchange the goal is reduced dependence on glasses, and vision with glasses before surgery is usually pretty good.
The Medicare Schedule descriptor of a cataract operation, which states that a cataract operation is “lens extraction or replacement with an intraocular lens, excluding surgery for the correction of refractive error”, is a good guide to what surgery qualifies as cataract surgery under Medicare and Insurance and what doesn’t. If your symptoms are reduced vision, or increasing glare, then replacement of your cloudy natural lens with an IOL is considered surgery for cataract and it will attract a medicare rebate and may be covered under your insurance policy. If you’re reason for surgery is to reduce dependence on glasses and your vision is otherwise OK then it probably isn’t covered under insurance.
I don’t perform surgery solely for correction of refractive error, although there are many excellent surgeons in Brisbane who do.
That blog post from 2016 still covers the available options for IOLs pretty well, except that EDOF IOLs have improved a great deal, and make up a bigger proportion of the IOLs we implant than they did then.