Q:
I think a lot of this can be simply answered by asking ourselves the following question:
If your wife/sister/daughter were pregnant and wanted refractive surgery, would any of us do it? Or wait till post delivery and post nursing?
No need for further studies, IMHO.
—
Kamran
A by Emil W. Chynn MD:
Kamran
While your question is certainly valid if the question is would you recommend getting refractive surgery during pregnancy or waiting until afterwards (I don’t think any of us would say we wouldn’t make the patient wait until afterwards)
Another question is much more valid if the question is about the true medical safety of refractive surgery on the fetus (not “theoretical/liability” concerns), and if pregnancy actually commonly causes refractive changes:
If we performed refractive surgery on a female loved one, and a week out she found out she was pregnant, would any of us be really concerned, or would we just plug, Punctal occlude, minimize drops, and tell her “don’t worry, I’m not worried, because there’s a 99.9% chance that your laser regime won’t affect your pregnancy, and a 99.9% chance that your pregnancy won’t have ANY SHORT OR LONG TERM EFFECT ON YOUR REFRACTIVE RESULT”
That’s what I (and I think most eye MDs) would say
—
Emil William Chynn, MD, FACS, MBA
Harvard/Columbia/Dartmouth/NYU/Emory-trained
1st eye surgeon in NY to get LASIK himself (1999)
Performed 5,000 LASIKs from 1996-2002
Switched to non-invasive LASEK in 2003
Have performed more LASEKs than any MD in US
