A Comparison of Corrective Effect on Astigmatism after LASIK and LASEK

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: We studied the effect of LASIK and LASEK for correction of myopic astigmatism and the clinical results in relation to preoperative astigmatism and operative methods. METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed the results of 176 eyes of 97 patients in the LASIK group and of 56 eyes of 29 patients in the LASEK group. All patients had undergone LASIK or LASEK for correction of myopic astigmatism with MEL-70TM (Aesculap-Meditec, Jena, Germany). Patients were divided into groups I (or=3.00D) according to preoperative astigmatism, and into groups A (LASIK) and B (LASEK) according to operative method. Each patient was followed up for over 6 months with measurements of uncorrected visual acuity, manifested refraction, and spherical equivalent at 1, 3, and 6 months after operation. RESULTS: In groups IA, IB, IIA, IIB, IIIA, IIIB, IVA, and IVB, preoperative cylindrical errors were 0.56 +/- 0.17D, 0.61 +/- 0.13D, 1.27 +/- 0.28D, 1.24 +/- 0.21D, 2.18 +/- 0.25D, 2.10 +/- 0.25D, 3.39 +/- 0.66D, and 3.50 +/- 0.61D, and postoperative 6-month astigmatism measurements were 0.33 +/- 0.49D, 0.34 +/- 0.36D, 0.28 +/- 0.30D, 0.63 +/- 0.44D, 0.48 +/- 0.42D, 0.44 +/- 0.57D, 0.86 +/- 0.42D, and 1.00 +/- 0.78D, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The correction of myopic astigmatism in LASEK was less effective than in LASIK at early postoperative periods, but they showed similar effect on the correction of astigmatism at 6 months after surgery, especially in the group with medium to low grade of astigmatism.