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Home > Archive > Lasik Eyes Surgery > December 2004 > Dr. says simultaneous bilateral refractive surgery violates informed consent
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Dr. says simultaneous bilateral refractive surgery violates informed consent
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| Letter printed in the J Cataract Refract Surg, Vol. 26, October 2000.
The editorial by a journal editor was overdue. I consider it
particularly appropriate that simultaneous bilateral laser in situ
keratomileusis (LASIK) is subjected to serious questioning. One can
only marvel at the naive trust by patients in modern medicine and in
their surgeons and the similarly naive convictions of surgeons that
simultaneous bilateral LASIK is what the patients need.
It is not purely a safety issue; simultaneous bilateral surgery
violates the principles of informed consent. Nobody can deny that
experience with the first eye will render the patient better informed
for consenting to the procedure being performed on the second eye.
Simultaneous bilateral surgery deprives the patient of the possibility
of gaining a better refracative outcome in the second eye and of
judging the visual benefit of the surgery by comparing the operated eye
+/- residual spectacle or contact lens correction with the corrected
unoperated eye. Finally, simultaneous bilateral LASIK preempts a
possible decision by the patient to choose another type of refractive
surgery for his/her second eye, such as photorefractive keratectomy,
intracorneal ring segments, or a phakic intraocular lens, or to
postpone surgery on the second eye until better procedures become
available if the result of LASIK on the first eye proves
unsatisfactory. He/she may not have to wait very long.
Klaus D. Teichmann, MD
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| serebel 2004-12-16, 9:26 am |
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Sandy wrote:
> Letter printed in the J Cataract Refract Surg, Vol. 26, October 2000.
>
> The editorial by a journal editor was overdue. I consider it
> particularly appropriate that simultaneous bilateral laser in situ
> keratomileusis (LASIK) is subjected to serious questioning. One can
> only marvel at the naive trust by patients in modern medicine and in
> their surgeons and the similarly naive convictions of surgeons that
> simultaneous bilateral LASIK is what the patients need.
>
> It is not purely a safety issue; simultaneous bilateral surgery
> violates the principles of informed consent. Nobody can deny that
> experience with the first eye will render the patient better informed
> for consenting to the procedure being performed on the second eye.
> Simultaneous bilateral surgery deprives the patient of the
possibility
> of gaining a better refracative outcome in the second eye and of
> judging the visual benefit of the surgery by comparing the operated
eye
> +/- residual spectacle or contact lens correction with the corrected
> unoperated eye. Finally, simultaneous bilateral LASIK preempts a
> possible decision by the patient to choose another type of refractive
> surgery for his/her second eye, such as photorefractive keratectomy,
> intracorneal ring segments, or a phakic intraocular lens, or to
> postpone surgery on the second eye until better procedures become
> available if the result of LASIK on the first eye proves
> unsatisfactory. He/she may not have to wait very long.
> Klaus D. Teichmann, MD
This clown's theory doesn't even reside in the same ballpark as
informed consent. He hasn't got a clue as to what informed consent
means.
SErebel
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