Initial Supervised Refractive Surgical Experience: Outcome of PRK and LASIK

Aim of this paper is to compare the visual outcome in supervised PRK and LASIK surgery. Materials and methods used are Retrospective review of cases performed with Technolas 217 Z platform between July 1, 2009 and June 30, 2010. Inclusion criteria were spherical equivalent of -0.50 to -09.50 diopters (D), refractive mean astigmatic error of -3.00 D, intention to provide full distance correction, and minimum 3-month postoperative follow-up after initial ablation RESULTS A total of 114 cases performed by 3 different surgeons met the inclusion criteria, 55 eyes underwent PRK and 59 eyes had LASIK. After initial treatment, mean uncorrected distance visual acuity (UDVA) at 3 months after PRK was log MAR 0.032 (0.097) and after LASIK was 0.017 (0.06). PRK was associated with a significantly better approximation between preoperative Best corrected distance visual acuity (BCVA) and postoperative UDVA (log MAR 0.002 vs.0.0322, P=0.005). Percentage of eyes that achieved UDVA of 20/20 or better was (89 % vs.92.3 %). There were no statistically significant differences between PRK and LASIK cases with respect to complication rates. The mean surgical time taken was 10.15 minutes for LASIK and 11.12 minutes for PRK (P=0.089). In this paper, Supervised PRK was associated with equal visual outcome and surgical time as compared to LASIK.