The cataract operation is safer with femtosecond laser.

-El doctor Laureano Alvarez-Rementeria held a live surgery from his clinic in Madrid in the 15th edition of the Congress of Ophthalmology FacoElche

Elche (Alicante), February 2013.- the cataract operation, one of the most frequent in the health system, is more secure with the femtosecond laser, a new procedure that has begun to be used in the last year as a complement to ultrasonic phacoemulsification, employed for 40 years. Thus reveal it several studies presented in Facoelche 2013, bringing together 800 Spanish ophthalmologists from Thursday until Saturday.

Femtosecond laser gets one endothelial cell loss less than ultrasound, according to a study published in January in the Journal of Refractive Surgery magazine. The authors analyzed the effectiveness of laser in cataract surgery performed after a cornea transplant. They checked that the failure of the corneal transplant after ultrasonic cataract phacoemulsification and intraocular lens implant ranges between 3 and 8%, whereas the laser”a success”. Another Australian research published in the January Journal of the Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery reveals that, although in a pre-treatment of femtosecond laser cataract intraocular pressure increases, the ascent is tolerable and safe. In addition, different ophthalmologists are proving that this technology can be used for the correction of another type of eye diseases. Therefore, its evolution continues and will give rise to more applications in eye surgery, as it concludes a review of advances in laser femtosecond published this month in the magazine Expert Review of Medical Devices.

Facoelche 2013 is organized by the doctor Fernando Soler and takes place from Thursday to Saturday in the Hotel Garden of the cure of Elche. It includes a live cataract with femtosecond laser operation since the Madrid clinic Rementeria, one of the four centres in Spain that has performed more cataract interventions with this technology, with more than 700. According to its director, Dr. Laureano Alvarez-Rementeria, femtosecond laser is safe and effective, since the greater part of the speech is guided by a computer, so the patient no longer dependent on the expertise of the surgeon for optimal results. Surgeon laser indicates the type of incision you need to do, the size and the position put the lens in a more precise way. Thus, adds, avoid the possibility of that lens is not centered, as it happens in many people intervened with the conventional technique, causing halos or stains on the vision ”.

Custom surgery

Femtosecond laser gets customized cataract surgery through a videomicroscope of high resolution which allows to use the eye of the patient as a direct reference. Thus, the intervention program to measure, depending on the patient’s Anatomy and the surgeon’s preferences. This does not happen so accurately with the traditional method of phacoemulsification by ultrasound where the technique is only manual and therefore the results may vary ”, indicates the doctor Alvarez-Rementeria.

The operation is painless, short (does not last more than 15 minutes) and the recovery is faster than the traditional method. The patient goes home looking blurry, but visual recovery has no place in the day, as it happened so far, but at times ”. Femtosecond scanning laser lens on its surface and in its interior, infrared waves, and through in millionths of a second, creates air bubbles that separate the molecules of the Crystal without cutting or burning any tissue. This way, it does not harm any adjacent cell.

The 15th edition of FacoElche brings together more than 800 ophthalmologists from Spain and the rest of the world and in it the latest technologies are used to publicize the latest medical advances applied to eye surgery. It also has an app this year to quickly and easily access any information related to the Congress.