A major study of LASIK outcomes was recently conducted at the Navy Refractive Surgery Center in San Diego. Called “PROWL-1” for “Patient Reported Outcomes with LASIK-1″, this study was the second phase of the “LASIK Quality of Life Collaboration Project” undertaken as a government partnership involving the FDA, National Eye Institute, and Department of Defense.

In the PROWL-1 study, 242 active duty military personnel underwent wavefront LASIK surgery on both eyes and were followed for 6 months. At 6 months, 99.5% of patients could see 20/20 or better without glasses and 98% were satisfied with the results of their surgery. Interestingly, most night vision problems were worse before surgery, including night ghost images, glare, and starburst, but the patients in the Navy study did have more night halos than pre-operatively.  Less than 1 percent of these patients felt their symptoms interfered with daily life. Also interestingly, dry eye symptoms were actually worse before surgery than at 6 months after surgery. The authors felt this might be to patients simply being permanently out of their contact lenses or even to anti-dry eye treatments such as omega-3 supplementation used during the surgical process.

Overall, the results were considered to be outstanding. In the words of one of the Navy researchers, ““The goal of the Navy Warfighter Refractive Surgery Program is to improve the safety and operational readiness of our service members. Feedback received from our patients show again and again that refractive surgery makes them safer and more effective as they work in dangerous and austere environments around the world.”