Some side effects of LASIK are extremely common, such as dry eye or night time glare symptoms in the first month.  While the majority of patients overcome these side effects, a small portion of patients may continue to have severe symptoms.  A patient with large pupils and dry eyes who also depends on excellent night vision for their occupation is probably not a good LASIK candidate because the risk of persistent glare symptoms may outweigh the patients desire to be less dependent on spectacles overall.  Risk and benefit are a patient driven balance.  A physicians task is to assist the patient to make the best decision for their situation and help minimize risk of LASIK or laser vision corrective surgery.

Here is a list and explanation of a few well described LASIK complications, many of which improve and resolve over time with appropriate treatment and conscientious care:

• Dry Eye
• Nighttime glare or halos
• residual refractive error/astigmatism requiring glasses or a touch up procedure
• Irregular flap or buttonhole flap
• Ectasia after LASIK
• LASIK flap without a hinge (freecap)
• interface haze or Diffuse Lamellar Keratitis
• Flap striae or wrinkles
• Epithelial ingrowth under the LASIK flap
• chronic epithelial erosions

Corneal ectasia is a condition where the cornea becomes unstable and has a warpaed shape to the corneal surface.  This may be due to the patient havinig an unstable cornea inherently (see keratoconus) or due to a thinned out cornea having too little tissue remaining in the corneal bed following refractive surgery.  These situations are avoided by avoiding large treatments in patients with thin corneas, and measuring the corneal bed during the refractive surgery.  Today LASIK surgeons carefully screen and avoid unstable appearing corneal surfaces prior to surgery to avoid ectasia risk.