Dr. Wesley K. Herman, founder and principle surgeon at Vision Quest in Dallas, Texas, has had an article published in The Waiting Room Magazine that shares a unique approach to helping people understand why nearly everyone will experience cataracts at some point in their lives. He starts by explaining that the eye is actually part of our brain…that the optic nerve is a fiber tract of the brain itself. Because of this fact, the role of oxygen, and the effects of oxygen deprivation, becomes vitally important to our eye health. The better our bodies are at capturing oxygen, the healthier our eyes will be.

The lenses of our eyes have a different fate when it comes to oxygen usage. As your eye lens is forming, it has a blood supply. However, at some point before birth, that blood supply withers and the lens must make its own energy without supplied oxygen. (Water makes up 70% of our tissues and water is 80% oxygen.) As the lens continues to grow and we age, it ultimately gets squeezed and the water within its cells is displaced, making the lens harder and less flexible. This is the start of presbyopia, a condition that makes it increasingly difficult to read things up close without reading glasses. Presbyopia typically starts around age 40.

This is also the manifestation of a cataract.

If you think of a young eye lens like the shape of an M&M, as you grow older that lens will begin to warp and sag into a teardrop shape due to the effect of water in the lens migrating downward. This causes cataract-induced astigmatism that cannot be corrected with glasses, contacts or LASIK.

There is no magic pill to correct a cataract.

The only way to correct vision that has been affected by a cataract is to remove the lens and replace it with a new intra ocular lens implant that is specifically selected for a precise, desired correction.

This is where the diamond comes in.

Diamond micro-knives are most commonly used to make the incision necessary to remove a cataract-affected lens. Lasers may also be used for this procedure. Traditional cataract surgery and laser cataract surgery in Dallas are both very effective techniques to restore clear vision to cataract patients.

If you are experiencing changes in your vision, contact the team at Vision Quest to schedule a cataract consultation in Dallas, Texas.