Many patients ask me how long surgery takes. The answer is more complicated than it may seem. Usually, a “standard” cataract surgery is short by surgery standards, but the number of minutes a cataract surgery actually takes from incision to completion does not represent how long the process takes the patient. There are so many…

When we talk about vision testing, we usually consider people reading eye charts. A visual acuity of “20/20” means that we expect someone to be able to see that part of the chart from 20 feet, and we think that that person can see the chart from 20 feet. So, if the second number (the…

Sometimes when we perform cataract surgery, the cataracts are so dense that we have to modify our technique. In order to properly see what we are doing, we sometimes need to use a dye with these dense cataracts. The dye I use is called Trypan Blue, and it is a deep royal blue color. It’s…

There is a technique in eye surgery in which parts of lens implants are directly placed into the wall of the eye. Typically, this is not how lens implants are placed. However, this technique can be helpful in certain complicated eye situations. I recently learned that one of the first doctors to describe this technique…

Up until recently, I was filling out an extra form about patient status since I am practicing in the Covid-19 era. This detailed form about things like patients sleep apnea status was only for surgical patients. I believe it has been about two weeks that I have not had to fill out the form. Whew–what…

The aqueous fluid is the fluid in the front of the eyeball. There is another compartment of the eyeball, the back compartment, which contains the vitreous fluid. The aqueous fluid is constantly produced and drained, so there is a lot more turnover of aqueous than vitreous. These fluids determine the pressure in the eye, and…

I believe that I’ve written about this before, but I just read some ophthalmology discussions that make me want to bring it out again. As eye surgeons, we are going to have surgical complications and errors some of the time. While some surgeons may be cynical, I believe that most patients are human just like…

I have discussed this before, but it always bears repeating. In the last few years, the marketplace for post-cataract lens implants has really exploded. This is a great thing for patients, as there are a lot of new options. Of course, as ophthalmologists, we need pay close attention to the nuances and intricacies of these…

Many ophthalmologists have moved away from routine use of eye drops post cataract surgery. Traditionally, I used three different medications in eye drop form for basically all patients after cataract surgery. In recent years, a technique involving placing antibiotics and steroid at the time of surgery has gained popularity as I noted above. Now, I…

I feel like I write too many posts like this, so I apologize if I am being repetitive. I just heard about another expensive industry product that seems to be doing some harm. I suppose I can’t say for sure whether it is doing more harm than good, but this harm is not associated with…