Incidence of Intraoperative and Early Postoperative Adverse Events in a Large Cohort of Consecutive Laser Vision Correction Treatments

Purpose: To evaluate the incidence of adverse events (AE) following laser vision correction.

Design: Retrospective case series.

Methods: Optical Express, UK. Patients/study population: patients who underwent laser in situ keratomileusis (LASIK) or photorefractive keratectomy (PRK) between July 1, 2014, and June 30, 2016. Intervention/observation procedures: all AEs recorded in the electronic medical record were extracted and retrospectively reviewed. The total incidence of AE and serious adverse events (SAE) was calculated. Loss of 2 or more lines of corrected distance visual acuity (CDVA) was calculated for the entire cohort of patients that attended a minimum of 3 months follow-up.

Main outcome measures: AEs; Preoperative and last available postoperative clinical data.

Results: A total of 31,921 (61,833 eyes) were included in the study for LASIK and 5,016 (9,467 eyes) for PRK. The total number of AE was 850 for LASIK (occurring in 783 eyes of 657 patients; incidence of 1.3% or 1:79 eyes) and 227 for PRK (occurring in 218 eyes of 170 patients; incidence of 2.3% or 1:43 eyes). In the LASIK group, there were 287 SAEs (271 eyes of 226 patients; incidence of 0.4% or 1:228 eyes), and the number of SAEs in PRK group was 65 (65 eyes of 39 patients; incidence 0.7% or 1:146 eyes). Combining LASIK and PRK data, the loss of 2 or more lines of CDVA was recorded in 0.37% of eyes.

Conclusions: Contemporary LASIK and PRK are safe procedures with a low incidence of serious adverse events.