Influence of Patient Age on.pdfVIP

Influence of Patient Age on Photorefractive Keratectomy for Myopia Anat Loewenstein, MD; Isaac Lipshitz, MD; Daniella Levanon, MD; Ayala Ben-Sirah, MD; Moshe Lazar, MD ABSTRACT 2 BACKGROUND: To determine whether the out- procedure. Deitz et al reported that older patients comes of photorefractive keratectomy (PRK) for achieve more refractive change than younger ones, myopia are age-dependent. given the same therapeutic parameters. In 1990, METHODS: The influence of age on PRK out- Rowsey3 presented nomograms classified by age and comes was analyzed for one eye of each of 72 amount of myopia, designed to facilitate calculation patients divided into two groups: 39 patients (18 to 26 years) and 33 patients (35 to 54 years). The influ- of the therapeutic dosage. Similar figures are given ence of the amount of preoperative myopia (low in other reports.1,2 myopia less than -4.00 diopters (D); moderate to Photorefractive keratectomy (PRK) procedures high myopia -4.00 or more D) was also evaluated. All have been performed at the Assutah Laser Center patients were followed for at least 1 year, and all and Ichilov Hospital since February 1992. It has been underwent cycloplegic refractions. RESULTS: One year after PRK, the average our impression from this experience that, as in radial refraction was -0.15 D in the younger group and keratotomy, for the same ablation, older patients tend +0.38 D in the older group. The achieved refraction to emerge with more myopia correction, leading to was higher than t