SEE WHAT YOU'VE BEEN MISSING…
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Femtosecond Laser
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Clear Advantage Vision Correction Center is the FIRST and ONLY center in Northern New England offering an "all laser", blade free, LASIK procedure. In fact, the DaVinci Femtosecond laser is one of the newest, and most advanced bladeless lasers on the market today.
OUR MISSION
To provide our patients with the most technologically advanced vision correction options in New England. Our highly experienced surgical staff is dedicated to educating patients on a variety of refractive procedures.
Dr. N. Timothy Peters is the only surgeon performing LASIK surgery at our practice and has performed over 11,000 LASIK surgeries to date. This makes him the most experienced surgeon in the Seacoast region and one of the most experienced in New England.
STEP ONE – Evaluating your eye
With advanced diagnostic tools, Clear Advantage can quickly and accurately determine your candidacy for LASIK surgery. The Zyoptix® Diagnostic Workstation allows for high-quality wavefront data to be obtained and carefully analyzed. This data then allows our surgeon to review your candidacy for LASIK based not only on your level of nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism, but also on your personal higher order aberration profile.
In addition, this unique diagnostic station from Bausch & Lomb is the only device that "sees" beyond your natural pupil to collect more eye print data, while other technologies are limited to just the pupil area. This is extremely important as the pupil frequently dilates, or enlarges, beyond the treated area, such as when you are driving at night. With other competing systems you are forced to see the road and oncoming traffic through only a partial correction. Many patients complain of glare and halos when treated on systems not offering this expanded treatment zone.
With Zyoptix®, you can rest assured that every measure has been taken to provide a safe and effective LASIK procedure.
Creating the Corneal Flap
The first step in vision correction is to create a thin flap in the cornea. In order to correct vision, it is necessary to expose the corneal layer beneath the surface, called the stroma. This is where the Bausch & Lomb excimer laser will do its work in reshaping the cornea.
Traditionally the corneal flap has been produced by using a mechanical device to create a hinged flap on the corneal surface. The surgeon folds it gently back for treatment, and replaces it afterwards. LASIK procedures have very few complications, but typically, when there is a complication, it is related to that small flap and how it was cut. The traditional device used to cut the flap is called a microkeratome, which is attached to the eye with a suction ring. It has a very precise, sharp blade that creates an accurate flap. Dr. N. Timothy Peters has performed over 11,000 procedures using the microkeratome and has tremendous success. However, as with any mechanical device, there is a remote possibility of an imperfect incision. These rare complications are usually corrected within a few months, after the patient has healed, with a different procedure.
THE BLADELESS LASER OPTION
The DaVinci femtosecond laser by Ziemer (www.Ziemergroup.com) solves the flap complication problem by using an extraordinarily fast and precise flap creation procedure.
Use of the DaVinci femtosecond laser gives you safer and more precise vision correction procedure. A femtosecond is a quadrillionth of a second, and this is the speed of each DaVinci laser pulse. Rather than having a blade cut the corneal flap, the DaVinci uses a fast, pulsed laser to create many microscopic bubbles just below the corneal surface. The laser moves back and forth over the designated treatment area on the eye, and creates a round, shallow area of these tiny bubbles. Then your eye surgeon can use a special instrument to gently lift that tissue and fold it back out of the way.
The DaVinci laser emits a very low-density series of pulses to do this, and is controlled by our surgeon, following your treatment plan. It is pre-determined exactly how deeply the laser will penetrate, so as not to affect the stroma where the excimer laser will work. Such subtle control is not possible with a microkeratome.
GREATER SAFETY
The DaVinci laser allows the ultra-precise creation of thinner and more evenly shaped corneal flaps than possible with a mechanical microkeratome. This allows for a more uniform surface for your excimer laser treatment and potentially better results. The safety profile of femtosecond lasers have been demonstrated in over 1 million cases, and it is widely accepted as a significantly safer procedure over the microkeratome. Another great comfort to patients is knowing that the DaVinci creates the corneal flap by using 2 million tiny bubbles linked in rows. In the unlikely event that something goes wrong during the flap creation, the surgeon will allow the patient to safely absorb the bubbles, and simply start over. Its almost a “no harm, no foul” concept!
Because of the enhanced safety record of femtosecond lasers, the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps have all approved, and strongly recommend its use for their personnel. NASA has also approved it for astronauts, who work under physically stressful conditions in space.
Customizing the Laser Treatment with the Zyoptix® Personalized Laser Vision Correction System
Zyoptix® is the very latest development in laser eye treatment from Bausch & Lomb. With greater assurance and a vision correction procedure that is truly personalized to detect and correct the unique errors in your vision, Zyoptix® truly brings LASIK to a higher level.
Among the Fastest Treatments
With a faster treatment, the technology used at Clear Advantage allows for the latest in LASIK with less anxiety. In fact, the LASIK procedure performed at Clear Advantage is among the fastest treatments available in the United States. In conjunction with the highly predictable results provided by precision diagnostic tools, this increased speed helps provide a greater assurance with the best possible result.
- Additionally, Clear Advantage utilizes one of the fastest eye trackers in the United States, which means the laser compensates for any inadvertent eye movement during the procedure
LASIK (Laser Assisted In-Situ Keratomileusis)
LASIK combines the proven techniques of both corneal flap and excimer laser surgery, resulting in dramatic results and rapid visual recovery. LASIK is effective for correcting most cases of nearsightedness, farsightedness and astigmatism. Generally, a traditional LASIK candidate would have a fairly small prescription without a significant amount of astigmatism. In addition, traditional LASIK would not improve higher order aberrations. (An example of higher order aberrations is glare and halos at night).
PRK (Photorefractive Keratectomy)
PRK is a safe, viable alternative to LASIK for many patients. Clear Advantage uses the same Technolas 217z excimer laser to perform PRK and LASIK and our pre-operative evaluation is identical as for LASIK including the use of Zywave wavefront sensing technology. During PRK, the top layer of the cornea is gently removed to prepare the eye for treatment. PRK uses a dilute alcohol solution to loosen the epithelium prior to removal. The excimer laser is then used to resculpt the shape of the cornea reducing your refractive error in the same fashion as is done after flap creation with LASIK. Anesthetic drops are used which numb the eye making the actual procedure painless.
ZYOPTIX customized LASIK
The very latest development in laser eye treatment from Bausch & Lomb is a system called Zyoptix. Zyoptix means that LASIK treatment is now unique to each eye. With Zyoptix, treatment is designed to treat your specific vision errors. Each Zyoptix treatment involves and extra screening process to allow the surgeon to understand each patients specific visual needs. Zyoptix is ideal for patients with larger prescriptions, large pupils or a heavy astigmatism. Zyoptix patients note improved driving ability at night with reduced or eliminated glare and halos (higher order aberrations).
Monovision
Monovision generally involves correcting one eye for a vision defect such as presbyopia to provide reading or intermediate vision in one eye, and correcting the other eye for distance vision. Monovision can be achieved through eye surgery or traditional means such as contact lenses.
The brain plays a role in monovision by "selecting" the appropriate image needed for near or far vision, while filtering out the "blurred" image. Not everyone adapts well to two different vision corrections at the same time and the adjustment may take time. To make sure monovision works for you, your eye doctor may recommend that you try contact lenses with monovision correction first before you make the more permanent decision of electing to have monovision eye surgery.
Even if you have a LASIK monovision treatment, you still may require extra correction from eyeglasses in certain circumstances such as night driving to make sure your vision is appropriately sharp. In addition, you may find that "middle" distance fields, such as a computer, lose some clarity. Monovision also may adversely affect depth perception, which might be an issue for athletes or airplane pilots.
Cataract Surgery and Elective Multifocal Lens Implants
A cataract is a clouding of all or part of the normally clear lens within your eye, which results in blurred or distorted vision. Cataracts are most often found in persons over age 55, but they are also occasionally found in younger people. A cataract can progress until eventually there is a complete loss of vision in your eye, and neither diet nor laser treatment will make the cataract go away. Cataract surgery can help restore your vision long before you experience loss of vision significant enough to interfere with your daily activities.
At Clear Advantage and our sister company, Eyesight Ophthalmic Services, we offer the most advanced options to customize your vision after cataract surgery, based on your individual lifestyle needs. Based on our findings during your upcoming examination, we will inform you of which lens is the best option for you. On the following page, you will find information that helps you understand three different options:
- Basic monofocal lens implant
- Acrysof® ReSTOR® premium lens implant
- Crystalens Accomodating IOL premium lens implant
- Acrysof® Toric premium lens implant
Basic Monofocal Lens
With single-vision lens implants, there is a very high likelihood that you will need glasses for most near-vision activities after surgery, even if you do not wear near-vision glasses before surgery. These activities include such things as reading, applying makeup, shaving, sewing, reading your watch, dialing a cell phone, and baiting fishhooks. Medicare and most private insurance carriers will pay 80% of your cataract surgery and the monofocal lens. This is considered basic coverage.
Acrysof® ReSTOR®
New technology implants, such as Acrysof® ReSTOR®, are designed to provide a full range of vision--near, far and everything in between. Based on FDA clinical data, 80% of patients never need glasses again for any activities. Those who do need glasses need them only for very specific tasks. The goal of the ReSTOR® lens is to allow you to live a spectacle-free life, to see things near and far without glasses.
Crystalens®
Although LASIK can satisfy the need for distance vision glasses, patients over 45 still require reading glasses for intermediate (computer distance) and near vision. The Crystalens is designed to mimic the eye's natural process of accommodation. Near and intermediate vision result from the action of the focusing muscle in the eye, called the ciliary muscle. This muscle changes the power and thus the focus of the natural lens. This enables the eye to automatically focus to provide distance, intermediate, and near vision. As we age, the natural lens hardens and cannot bend to allow this range of vision. The Crystalens is the only lens implant that has flexible hinges that allow it to bend with the ciliary muscle to imitate the way a patient's natural lens used to work. Other monofocal IOLs are fixed and stationary within the eye.
Acrysof® Toric
The Acrysof® Toric lens is specifically designed to address those who have a significant amount of astigmatism. In years past, cataract surgery removed the cataract, but a patient with high astigmatism still required glasses for near and distance vision. The design of the Acrysof® Toric lens makes it possible to reduce or eliminate astigmatism and significantly improve uncorrected distance vision.
OUR STAFF
N. Timothy Peters, MD
Dr. Peters is a fellowship trained cornea specialist and the most experienced LASIK surgeon in the Seacoast area, having performed over 11,000 LASIK procedures. Because of his broad experience, Dr. Peters has been selected to be a clinical trainer and proctor for other refractive surgeons.
Dr. Peters has authored and/or edited multiple textbooks on LASIK and Wavefront LASIK technology, and has published multiple articles in peer-reviewed journals. He appears as a guest lecturer at numerous national ophthalmic meetings. Dr. Peters is the ONLY surgeon in the Northeast serving as a clinical consultant for Bausch & Lomb. In addition, Dr. Peters and the staff at Clear Advantage participate in a number of clinical studies on various LASIK and post-LASIK procedures. These privileges offer Clear Advantage patients some of the most advanced, up-to-date and cutting-edge medical technology available worldwide.
Christopher Turner, OD
Dr. Christopher Turner grew up in Manhattan, KS. After graduating from Kansas State University in 1996 with a Bachelor of Science degree, Dr. Turner moved to Memphis, TN, to attend Southern College of Optometry, graduating in May of 2000. He is one of a select few optometrists in the Seacoast area with refractive surgery pre-operative and post-operative care experience. Having worked in a variety of optometric settings, his skill and dedication are an asset to Clear Advantage.
Lauren McLoughlin, OD
After graduating from SUNY College of Optometry, Dr. McLoughlin completed her residency in ocular disease and primary care at the VA Medical Center in Wilmington Delaware. In addition to her training and experience in pre-operative and post-operative LASIK care, Dr. McLoughlin has practiced in a variety of optometric and ophthalmic settings and has owned two optometric practices in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.
OUR LOCATION
Centrally located in Portsmouth, NH, directly across from Portsmouth Regional Hospital in the Jackson-Gray Medical Building, Clear Advantage is just one hour from Boston, MA, Manchester, NH, and Portland, ME.
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