Maes is not just any Republican -- he won the Republican primary. He's now running for Governor of Colorado against the American Constitution Party's Tom Tancredo (who makes him look reasonably sane) and the Democrats' John Hickenlooper (who's sitting back watching the trains crash). Blame it on mail-in ballots . . . who knows how many voters dropped their ballots in the mail, THEN heard Maes talk crazy, and realized they didn't have all the info they needed to choose wisely after all!
I've read most the responses, and they seem to line up pretty well with the research I did. What isn't mentioned much, however, are the non-vision-related side effects.
I had PRK done 13 months ago -- my corneas were borderline too thin for LASIK (and yes, that is a risk factor). PRK, by the way, is VERY painful, for many days afterwards, which is one of the reasons why LASIK is more popular. It also takes a while for PRK results to clear up and stabilize, so there's no "eureka" moment. On the other hand, with PRK there tends to be less chance for your vision to revert months or years later . . . but I digress.
My surgery went perfectly: my vision (previously 20/100, not too bad really) is now 20/15, I have no fog, no stars at night, and my depth perception has improved -- in short, my vision is as good as it could be. I am, however, afflicted with dry eye syndrome, a very common side effect. It is especially bad in the winter, thanks to central heat, and when I work for long hours at the computer. (!)
The remedy is eye drops, instilled as needed, on some days only a couple times, but on others, a few times an hour. It's important to keep at it, even when you don't feel too bad, because the fine scratches caused by the eyelid dragging across the cornea can cause future problems, including reduced vision quality and increased chance of serious eye conditions.
In the past few months, a new problem has developed: as I sleep, the top surface of my eyeball sometimes glues itself to the inside of my eye socket. When I wake up and blink, that connection is broken, and surface cells from my eyeball are torn away. Needless to say, it's rather painful, and takes hours to really feel better. Why laser surgery would cause this is unknown; the common explanation is that the eye and socket tissues swell up and squish together, and the solution is saline eye drops just before bed, which cause the tissues to shrink. They burn a bit, but they do seem to do the trick.
In short -- I wore gas-permeable contacts for 17 years, and they worked just fine. I love having even better vision now, but I can't say that I spend much less time fiddling with my eyes than before. Successful laser surgery = no more cleaning contacts, no more cleaning/fixing glasses, etc, but laser surgery =! having zero-maintenance eyes.
A firm I work with has recently used Transera International Logistics out of Houston, Texas, to ship a rather large, expensive industrial unit to Kazakstan. They thought it was pretty reasonable cost-wise, plus they're bonded and insured. The item is still in transit, so no word yet on the success of this method . . .
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Maes is not just any Republican -- he won the Republican primary. He's now running for Governor of Colorado against the American Constitution Party's Tom Tancredo (who makes him look reasonably sane) and the Democrats' John Hickenlooper (who's sitting back watching the trains crash). Blame it on mail-in ballots . . . who knows how many voters dropped their ballots in the mail, THEN heard Maes talk crazy, and realized they didn't have all the info they needed to choose wisely after all!
I've read most the responses, and they seem to line up pretty well with the research I did. What isn't mentioned much, however, are the non-vision-related side effects.
I had PRK done 13 months ago -- my corneas were borderline too thin for LASIK (and yes, that is a risk factor). PRK, by the way, is VERY painful, for many days afterwards, which is one of the reasons why LASIK is more popular. It also takes a while for PRK results to clear up and stabilize, so there's no "eureka" moment. On the other hand, with PRK there tends to be less chance for your vision to revert months or years later . . . but I digress.
My surgery went perfectly: my vision (previously 20/100, not too bad really) is now 20/15, I have no fog, no stars at night, and my depth perception has improved -- in short, my vision is as good as it could be. I am, however, afflicted with dry eye syndrome, a very common side effect. It is especially bad in the winter, thanks to central heat, and when I work for long hours at the computer. (!)
The remedy is eye drops, instilled as needed, on some days only a couple times, but on others, a few times an hour. It's important to keep at it, even when you don't feel too bad, because the fine scratches caused by the eyelid dragging across the cornea can cause future problems, including reduced vision quality and increased chance of serious eye conditions.
In the past few months, a new problem has developed: as I sleep, the top surface of my eyeball sometimes glues itself to the inside of my eye socket. When I wake up and blink, that connection is broken, and surface cells from my eyeball are torn away. Needless to say, it's rather painful, and takes hours to really feel better. Why laser surgery would cause this is unknown; the common explanation is that the eye and socket tissues swell up and squish together, and the solution is saline eye drops just before bed, which cause the tissues to shrink. They burn a bit, but they do seem to do the trick.
In short -- I wore gas-permeable contacts for 17 years, and they worked just fine. I love having even better vision now, but I can't say that I spend much less time fiddling with my eyes than before. Successful laser surgery = no more cleaning contacts, no more cleaning/fixing glasses, etc, but laser surgery =! having zero-maintenance eyes.
A firm I work with has recently used Transera International Logistics out of Houston, Texas, to ship a rather large, expensive industrial unit to Kazakstan. They thought it was pretty reasonable cost-wise, plus they're bonded and insured. The item is still in transit, so no word yet on the success of this method . . .