How to keep your eyes healthy after laser eye surgery
World Sight Day 2022
Today is World Sight Day, so we’re marking the occasion with some advice about how to keep your eyes healthy after laser treatment. Your sight is the most important sense you have so it’s crucial to do all you can to preserve it. There are a number of lifestyle changes you can make in order to boost your eye health, from eating a good diet and exercising, to avoiding UV ray exposure and practicing good contact lens hygiene.
If you’ve found that your sight has been an issue for you, having laser eye surgery is an excellent way to improve your vision. It also allows you to live life free from glasses and contact lenses, minimising the hassles that come with them in daily life. Like with any surgery, the recovery from laser eye surgery is crucial in ensuring a smooth healing process and good overall results. We’re going to look into some of the best, most effective ways to keep your eyes healthy after laser eye surgery, in order to protect your vision.
1. Attend laser eye surgery aftercare appointments
This is our number one piece of advice for our laser eye surgery patients. Depending on whether you have LASIK or LASEK treatment, your first aftercare appointment with either be on day 1 (LASIK) or day 3-5 (LASEK). Following this, you should visit us 7-14 days after surgery, 1 month after surgery, and finally 3 months after surgery. At your 3 month appointment, you will be discharged if both you and the optometrist are satisfied with your vision. It is crucial that you attend all of these appointments within the right timeframes. Having your eyes examined by a specialist will allow any signs of infection to be detected early on, and allows us to track your healing process properly.
2. Avoid water getting in your eyes
You should avoid getting water in your eyes for the first week after your laser eye surgery. This is because water can contain particular bacteria and parasites which pose a risk to your eye health. In the first few days after eye surgery, your eyes can be a little more vulnerable to infection, so it’s important to protect them during this time. You should also avoid getting any soap or shampoo in your eyes as this is likely to cause discomfort and potentially affect the healing process. Try to have baths rather than showers, or to adjust the shower head to angle from the neck down only.
3. Do not rub your eyes
Rubbing your eyes while they heal from laser eye surgery can be very disruptive. If you’ve had LASIK treatment, whereby a flap is made in your cornea, rubbing your eye can actually dislodge the flap and cause it to lift. This is likely to be painful and will affect your vision, and will also require an emergency appointment to replace the flap. Even if you had LASEK rather than LASIK, rubbing your eyes will still interfere with the healing process and potentially damage your eyes. If you feel any itchiness or irritation that makes you want to rub your eyes, you can try administering eye drops instead to provide relief. At night, we recommend that you wear eye shields for the first week to prevent you from rubbing or knocking your eyes in your sleep.
4. Following an eye drops routine
Before you leave the clinic after your surgery and head home to recover, you will be given a selection of eye drops to use. These will keep your eyes hydrated and help them to heal. One of the main side effects of laser eye surgery, especially during the first few days, can be dry eyes. Making sure your eyes are hydrated with drops is essential in ensuring good healing and comfort, as well as helping to minimise the effects of dry eyes.
5. Avoid looking at digital screens
One of the most important elements of laser eye surgery recovery is to avoid digital screens. In today’s society, it can be difficult to spend a few hours away from screens, particularly when smart phones are such an integral part of communication. However, in the first few hours after laser eye surgery, your eyes are likely to be especially light sensitive. You might find it easier to spend time away from screens and rest in a dark room with your eyes closed. Lots of our patients say that they listen to podcasts, music or simply nap in order to allow their eyes to heal. Even if you’re not having laser eye surgery, too much time spent around digital screens can negatively impact your eye health, which you can read more about on our blog here.
6. Avoid dusty environments
Have you ever been in a windy environment and, after a sudden gust, found yourself with dust in your eyes? We all know how unpleasant that feels on a standard day, let alone in the first week after your laser eye surgery. Dust particles could lead to an infection and disrupt the healing process and, coupled with that, you really shouldn’t rub or rinse your eyes after laser treatment. To avoid this type of scenario, we tell all our patients to avoid dusty environments for the week after their surgery. This can apply to building sites and even underground transport systems which typically have huge amounts of dust in the air.
Following these tips will help to keep your eyes healthy during your laser eye surgery recovery. If you have any further questions about aftercare, you can read more about our Lifetime Aftercare Guarantee or the patient journey. Our sight is perhaps the most important of all our senses, so it’s crucial we do all we can protect and preserve it.
If you’d like to start your Optimax journey, you can book your FREE consultation online, or via the phone by calling us on 0800 093 1110. Your journey to clear, natural vision starts here.
