I like to know in advance what I’m going to need to deal with. I know lots of people who have had cataract surgery but none of them say anything more than they are glad they did it, some wish they’d done it sooner, one said it was a challenge keeping track of the timing of the drops, and one said yellow things are now white. So, I decided to give you details about my process in case you want to know more. If not, stop reading now.
For me, it started with a regular eye exam to get a new prescription. My doctor said she couldn’t get me all the way back to 20/20 so suggested I have my cataracts removed.
When I went for my appointment with the surgeon, it actually started with two other people doing various tests and measurements before I met with the doctor–a two hour appointment overall. I chose a young doctor on the theory that he was more likely to be up-to-date on how to handle all this. I had also read lots of literature about choosing what lenses I want and what procedure he will use and we discussed what my goals are thus what we should do in surgery.
Most people choose to have their distance vision fixed. But, we all know I’m not most people, right? I chose to have my near vision fixed. Mostly because I’ve worn glasses for 50+ years so I don’t think I’d recognize myself without them.
At the end of that appointment the surgeon prescribed eye drops for me to use before and after surgery. For most doctors this can be several types of drops to use at various times of day. My doctor ordered my drops to be compounded by Westmoreland Pharmacy to be mailed to me. By compounding the drops by percentages of each I only needed to take one type of drops. For the surgery, anyway. I have other drops to treat glaucoma and dry eyes so I’m glad to only have to add one new style.
I have several plastic gadgets to help me get drops in my eyes but this new medicine would not work for any of those holders. Then I discovered Droppy on Amazon. This gadget does not require you to fit the drop bottle into a clamp on holder and it makes it much easier to hit the target. It does require some assembly, which I had Dave help do, but then I could do the drops myself without his assistance. I highly recommend this product to anyone needing any type of eye drops.
My doctor has a surgery scheduler who schedules both surgery dates (one for each eye two weeks apart), both post-op dates, the pre-op physical and the post-op appointment with my regular eye doctor to get a new prescription. It really helps to have all those providers be part of the same medical system. While they gave me a date and time for most of those appointments, they only gave me a date for the surgery itself. The scheduler also sent me a ton of literature on what to do when relating to the surgery. A couple days before the surgery someone contacted me with the time of my surgery.
The next step is a pre-op physical. It has to be done within 30 days of surgery. Since I was having a cataract removed from each eye, two weeks apart, the physical needed to be about a week before the first surgery.
At the pre-op physical the doctor’s main focus was to be sure my heart and lungs would handle the surgery and its associated anesthesia and which medicines I should stop taking when. I had one medicine I needed to stop one week before, and another two days before, and another one I needed to stop one day before. I put those in my calendar with reminders since I didn’t trust my own memory.
I also had to make a list as to which medicine I stopped when. Fortunately, my medical system prints out a current list of my meds at every visit so I simply made notes on one of the lists. Twice. Once for each eye.
OK. Now we are ready for surgery day.
In the pre-op cubicle they handed me a gown and told me to leave on everything except my shirt, put on the gown, then lie down on the gurney. Except I wear Crocs for shoes and you can’t really lie down wearing those. So for me, it was no shirt, no shoes, to get service.
Then the staff started putting a million drops in my eyes. The first one includes an anesthetic and it burns. After that I didn’t feel the rest of the drops except for when they ran out the side of my eye and down my cheek. A nurse was kind enough to dry my cheek when I asked. They also gave me a warmed blanket when I said I was cold.
And other people put on monitors and an IV and all that stuff.
Then they wheeled me down the hall to the operating room. And I got motion sick from watching the ceiling fly by. Then the sedative kicked and and I didn’t know anything more until I woke up as they wheeled me from the operating room to post op.
In post op they taped a shield over my eye. It is transparent and has little holes in it. They put the tape on the right and left side so I can still see straight ahead. The shield is a good thing because on that first day or two, I felt like I had something in my eye so I wanted to try to get it out. That something is probably my new lens and I definitely don’t want it to come out.
Of course I can’t really see even straight ahead because I can’t wear my glasses with the shield on. Except for the dark glasses Westmoreland Pharmacy sent me with my compounded eye drops. They are kind of like safety glasses in that they block light from the side and the top as well as in front. Those fit over the eye shield so I wore them home to reduce glare.
I have to wear the shield every night for a week and any time I nap if I do that in bed. Since I usually take my naps in my recliner, I don’t have to tape the shield on to take a nap. But, I do wear my glasses while napping so that, when I wake up and reach for my eyes, I run into my glasses which yell, “Don’t rub!”
Starting on day two, I can wear my regular glasses during the day. Except I still can’t really see because one part of one eye now has a different focal length so I spend all my time trying to decide whether or not to close one eye and, if so, which one?
I’m glad I had my near vision fixed because I read a lot. So, once the first eye started healing I realized I could take my glasses off to read. If you watch TV a lot instead, you might want to get your distance vision fixed for the same reason. I also realized that, if I had my distant vision corrected instead of my near vision, I could have gone to the drug store to buy readers to use while my eyes healed. If both eyes needed the same correction.
The eye with the cataract still there turns everything yellow while the one with the new lens makes everything bright white. Remember those huge windows in our living room? And that it is winter, when snow reflects sunlight? So, do I wear sunglasses in the apartment or not? I sort of miss the cataract that dimmed all that.
The day after surgery I went back to see the doctor to have things evaluated. During that appointment they discovered the pressure in my eye was too high so the doctor gave me a sample of eye drops to use twice a day for a week to bring that pressure down. Oh, goody! More drops to figure out when to take. I finally started keeping a list on my phone as to which drops I took at what time since there’s no way I could remember all that.
Two weeks later I went back and did it all again in the other eye. This time the sedative did not put me to sleep so I got to watch a psychedelic show during the surgery. And I persuaded them to let me sit up going down the hallways so I didn’t get sick.
The surgery and healing time takes six weeks from the first surgery before you get your new prescription then you still need to get new glasses. Unless you paid a ton of money to get fancy “lifestyle” lenses.
I didn’t.
Thus, my insurance paid for everything except my deductible. Well, I still haven’t got my new glasses yet but my insurance says they pay for those, too, after surgery. Isn’t insurance great?
So, now you know what is involved. Do you wish you didn’t?
TTYL,
Linda