Getting rid of the need for reading glasses: the Kamra Inlay

Presbyopia creates the need for reading glasses over the age of 45, it’s like struggling against the tide, ultimately everyone will need reading glasses. Most people find this unwanted onset of blurred near sight a big aggravation and the need to take reading glasses everywhere even more so. It’s an indicator of ageing and the desire to avoid it is great.

In the past the solution to remove the need for reading glasses has long been less than ideal. Laser eye surgery by itself can only correct for one distance range and therefore for individuals over the age of 45 the choice has been to either correct both eyes for distance vision and wear reading glasses, or a procedure known as monovision, where one of the eyes is fixed for distance vision and the other eye for near vision.
The downside to monovision is the fact that using one of your eyes for distance vision and the other for near vision won't permit fine depth perception, or stereopsis. Our eyes have developed especially to grant us fine depth perception and the loss of this is a large sacrifice.

Monovision also allows us to read because it makes one eye shortsighted and this refraction means a closer point of focus. The unfortunate issue with this is the prerequisite for reading glasses gets stronger as you grow older, and generally within a decade monovision will not be good enough to allow fine reading and will require future augmentation. This fact often leads to the widely thought misconception that laser eye surgery only lasts a decade. The truth of the matter is that the distance correction should really last for the rest of your lifetime; it is just ability to read which will degrade as time advances.

The Kamra inlay is a novel innovative technique that overcomes a lot of the disadvantages of typical endeavours to gain independence from reading eyeglasses along the lines of monovision. It is tiny, at a diameter of only 3.8mm, black donut containing a central 1.6 mm aperture which is a mere 5 microns thick. That is actually thinner than a single cell on the surface of the cornea. It is utilised along with a Blade-free or femtosecond laser eye surgery procedure and is placed in the bed of the created flap at the conclusion of the case in just the non-dominant eye.

The basic principle is that a narrowed aperture to look through boosts the range of focus, allowing a full spectrum of vision from distance, intermediate, and all the way to the littlest line of print for near. It’s a very similar idea to the one observed in photography where a lessened aperture improves the depth of focus in a photo which means subjects seen simultaneously in the distance and in the foreground are viewed with sharp relief.

The beauty of the technique is numerous:

1. One can continue to keep the two eyes seeing well for extended distance and thereby keep hold of the imperative appreciation of depth perception that's unfortunately lost with monovision operations.
2. As opposed to the isolated near 'sweet spot' observed in monovision procedures, someone with the Kamra inlay has the whole range of vision from distance all the way to near with everything in the middle in sharp focus too.
3. The improved focal depth that is attained is acceptable to cover you over your entire life no matter what the power of spectacles that could have been required at that age and thus you may well retain independence from spectacles for the duration of your life without needing to have anything else done.
4. It delivers great reassurance to people having the treatment that it is able to be completely reversed.
5. Even patients with a conventional monofocal lens after a cataract extraction procedure would have the opportunity to read with a Kamra inlay in without all the issues encountered with multi-focal intraocular lenses such as observing halos around bright lights.
6. Individuals who have already had LASIK operations before can still have the Kamra inlay implanted as a secondary procedure when they start to need reading glasses.
7. Folks who already have good long range vision and only require reading glasses are the most suitable candidates for the Kamra inlay, as contrary to the monovision procedure in the past, now they don't need to give up the quality of their distance vision to reach their aim of eradicating the readers.

The enormous desire from the forty somethings and beyond to obtain independence from reading glasses will allow the remarkable step forward the Kamra inlay represents to make a substantial impact in the area of vision correction; the Kamra – the tiny revolution!

Dr. James Genge is a qualified and respected eye surgeon from the Northern Beaches in Sydney Australia. To learn more about the Kamra inlay, check out his website at Laser Eye Surgery Sydney.