Oct 23, 2008 8:27 am US/Eastern
HealthWatch: The Blinding Truth About Cataracts
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
Cataracts are the most common cause for vision loss in the United States. Removing them is the most common surgical procedure in the country, with two million last year alone.
Yet there are many misconceptions about cataract removal. Here to help clear things up is Dr. Max Gomez with more on how technology is making this procedure available to more and more people.
Cataract removal is one of the most successful of all operations, with a 98 percent success rate. It used to be that doctors told patients to wait until their cataract was ripe before taking it out. But by then, you may have been visually impaired for some years.
Fortunately, that's no longer necessary, as one woman found out.
Mildred Roehrig is a whiz at needlepoint and other crafts that require fairly keen eyesight. But over the past few years, she noticed that she was having more and more trouble doing the things she loved.
"I couldn't read anymore, couldn't do any kind of crafts. It was getting to be bad because I couldn't even crochet. I would drop stitches. And I couldn't drive either," said Roehrig.
Mildred had cataracts in her eyes, a clouding of the crystalline lens behind her iris, the colored part of her eye. She waited a while before having her cataract removed, partly because there's a common misconception about when to have the surgery. But that was based on old technology.
"In the older method of cataract extraction we made a large incision, we popped the whole cataract out in one piece. Now if the cataract hadn't received that mature stage, it could potentially break up into small pieces," said Dr. Ben Chang of Stahl Eye Center.
But modern cataract removal uses Phacoemulsification. A fancy way of saying ultrasound liquefies the cataract and vacuums it out through a tiny incision. It's effective and safe to do as soon a cataract is impairing your vision.
"You don't want to put it off until let's say your driving ability is impaired, your driving safety is impaired, your enjoyment of reading, watching television, your hobbies could be compromised," said Dr. Chang.
It used to be that Mildred's husband had to help her put on her jewelry. Now after she had her right eye done, she can needlepoint and can't wait to get the other eye done.
"The dark to the light? There's no comparison. I can see the needle, I can see the hole, I can see what I'm sewing," exclaimed Roehrig.
Removing the cataract is only part of the solution. In almost all cases the cloudy lens is replaced with an artificial one that restores the patient's ability to focus without having to wear those old, thick coke-bottle glasses.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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