In medicine, there’s generally a ten-year period with each procedure where patients are closely observed in various studies for side effects. That’s partly why Lasik took so long to be accepted amongst the greater population and doctors themselves – everyone was waiting and “observing” the initial batch of patients to see if there were any bad side effects 10 years later.
As always though, there are certain criteria and individual patient factors which may make you more suitable for one procedure over the other, so definitely get an opinion from your ophthalmologist before deciding “I definitely only want this procedure”.
In truth, Lasik is all about “case selection”, meaning the doctor’s expertise is in choosing the most appropriate treatment for each unique patient, which will produce the best results and minimise side effect. The procedure itself is relatively straightforward, as it’s mostly done by the machine.
