I am hoping to enhance my vision slightly to 20/20 in each eye separately, primarily to start flying commercially again.
• I am 51 years old and have been wearing contacts or glasses for the last 25 years.
• With glasses or soft contacts I am approximately 20/30 in each eye separately.
• I have recently started using scleral contact lenses which are filled with sterile water prior to placement and have the effect of giving the eye a smooth uniform shape. These contacts are hard and have improved my vision. I am now able to get close to 20/20 (but missing 1 or 2 letters, and the others very hard to see) with each eye separately. I think these contacts have the effect of “removing” the astigmatism.
• I have recently started to look at surgery again, although 10 years ago a LASIK company said I was not a suitable candidate due to the astigmatism I have. The LASIK company may have had other reasons why I was not a good fit for surgery, but I can’t recall what they were. They also said that the LASIK surgery if successful would not improve my vision over what I was able to achieve with glasses or soft contacts.
• I am curious to know if eye surgery has changed/improved in last 10 years and whether I could now be a viable candidate.
• I would be interested to know if anyone has had any success with the William H Bates type eye exercises, and if yes how much did the eyes improve and how long did it take.
• I am in some ways very close to my 20/20 goal to be able to fly commercially again, and it seems a risk to be even contemplate surgery, even if it would work.
Any thoughts/suggestions are very much appreciated.