When is the best time for cataract surgery?

SAMER HAMADA DISCUSSES THE BEST TIME FOR CATARACT TREATMENT

When you feel that your cataract is getting worse and affecting your life, you might consider seeing your surgeon to discuss an operation.

There is no urgency to have a cataract operation. It’s an elective procedure. However, it is advisable not to leave it for so long, and there are many reasons for that. One of the reasons is that your cataract will continue to progress and you’ll realise that your life is getting more and more compromised by the cataract. For example, at the start, you find you’re struggling to drive, so you decide to stop driving at nighttime. But, gradually, when the cataract gets worse, you find actually you can’t recognise faces or even drive during the daytime. This is the time to have the surgery.

Remember, with time the cataract gets harder and denser, so the surgery itself will take longer and the complication rate would increase slightly as well. Some patients choose to have cataract surgery sooner because they like to take advantage of the available technologies such as the new multifocal lens implants. They want to be free of glasses, and one of the ways is to have multifocal lens implants in the eye when you do the cataract surgery.