A LASIK patient from Santa Barbara that I saw in my Ventura office last week asked me about how to safely view tomorrow’s eclipse. First, those who have had LASIK or PRK are no different form anyone else in terms of the safety guidelines they should follow to protect the eyes during a solar eclipse. The American Academy of Ophthalmology offers a resource guide to eye safety during an eclipse. The only time it is safe to look directly at the sun is during the “totality” phase of the eclipse, the time the the moon completely blocks the sun and the world becomes very, very dark. In our area, there we will not have totality at any point during the eclipse, so there is no safe time to look directly at the sun. We will only experience a partial eclipse and, for us,  looking at the sun at any time during the eclipse could cause permanent retinal damage and visual loss. You must protect your eyes if you look toward the sun. The only way to look directly at the sun is through highly specialized solar filters which meet a worldwide test standard known as ISO 12312-2. Unfortunately, the marketplace has been inundated with counterfeit solar filter glasses that may be labeled as ISO 12312-2 but in fact actually are fake. These are very dangerous as they will not protect your eyes. The American Astronomical Society has published a list of reputable vendors of solar filters and viewers.  Be aware that normal sunglasses, even with very dark lenses and UV protection, do not protect your eyes while looking at the sun. Even proper solar filter “eclipse glasses” may not provide full protection if they have scratches or are damaged. Also, never look at the sun through a camera, binoculars, or telescope (during an eclipse or otherwise) as these intensify light rays and can cause damage even if you are also using solar filter eclipse glasses. Other than directly looking at the sun with proper safety precautions, you also could view the eclipse indirectly by making a pinhole viewer and projecting the image onto a screen or other surface to view it safely. Alternatively, NASA will be running live stream video of the eclipse.