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Comment by jsymolon | Hacker News Reader

I went from glasses and astigmatism to LASIK and halos.

I would still do it again and recommend it.

The quality of life improvement is tremendous and the amount of money saved on not getting the glasses re-done every year offsets the cost of the LASIK.

Halos, really only at night, is corrected by wearing a yellow tint "sunglass" aka shooters glasses while driving.

Plus my SO really doesn't like my driving, so i chill out in the passenger seat anyway. They feel more in control and i can get some sleep.

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This makes no sense, unless you were a kid why would you have to get your glasses "re-done" every year? I've been wearing the same prescription for a decade and the same plastic frames for seven years. I go to the ophthalmologist every two years to get my optic drusen looked at and my corrected vision is fine. If I didn't go for my drusen I would have no reason to go. If your vision is so unstable that you were getting a new prescription every year then you are an likely a very poor candidate for LASIK and your LASIK vision would just revert anyways.

The only time I had to get a new prescription every few months was when I was a child so my vision was changing rapidly.

>Halos, really only at night, is corrected by wearing a yellow tint "sunglass" aka shooters glasses while driving.

Please do not wear these glasses while driving. They are dangerous [1]

[1] https://trid.trb.org/view.aspx?id=113228

I'm not sure where you get your Informaton but for one, in order to re-order contact lenses you must have a current rx (within 1-2 years) and it is standard to get an eye exam every year. Many people have eyesight that progressively gets worse and require a new rx yearly.

> Many people have eyesight that progressively gets worse and require a new rx yearly.

And many people have had the same prescription for 4-5 years or more, and don't have eyes that continue to get worse.

I think the GP's point was that either your eyes continue to get worse every year, and you need new glasses, and LASIK probably won't last forever, or you don't, and LASIK is a one-time expense that will take quite a while to break even on in a strictly financial sense.

Yes, exactly, thank you.

If your vision is so unstable you need a new RX every year your LASIK isn't going to last very long. Hence you probably are a very poor candidate for LASIK and it makes no sense from a strictly financial sense.

Unless you wear contacts, which can get pretty expensive, but probably not as expensive as LASIK that lasts 10 years.

I'm not sure why you'd get an eye exam every year unless you were having problems or needed a new prescription.

> it is standard to get an eye exam every year

I'm sure your ophthamologist will be happy to recommend getting exams as often as possible, like your dentist.

I've had the same prescription for 10 years. I had the same glasses for 10 years until I bought new ones for cheap on the internet this year using a 3 year old prescription.

> This makes no sense, unless you were a kid why would you have to get your glasses "re-done" every year?

I don't know about the parent poster above, but my vision is slowly but consistently getting worse every year, for the last five years now. I get my glasses "re-done" each year because my prescription has changed (gotten slightly stronger) each year, and it's cheaper to get new glasses than to re-lens old ones.

If I didn't stare at a screen for 60 hours a week, minor prescription changes might not matter so much. But since I do, wearing a prescription that's only slightly off can still cause some headaches or eye pain.

In that case LASIK isn't going to last long, hence you're a poor candidate for LASIK if you're needing a new prescription that often.

I just looked it up and the LASIK website said a stable prescription for at least two years is required.

Just hit the over 40 bump ... readers are necessary.

I went from needed bifocals to just readers and in 15 years; of wearing 1+ to 1.25+. Now, for fine detail work, i look like the guy from Toy Story 2 with magnifiers up to +4. SMTs are tiny !

Normal computer work, still +1s. I do need a lot more light though.

I got LASIK, and I had stable vision. It's saved me thousands of dollars now.

Not everyone is as careful and/or inactive as you :)

I've lost more pair of prescription sunglasses at the bottom of the ocean/lakes within a few years than you seem to have owned in total over the course of a decade. Basically glasses to me meant $500/yr in replacements due to breakage or losing them in various situations. Yes, completely my fault and preventable - but just not who I am. After beating myself up about this for years, I just realized I have better things to do with my brain cycles than keep track of glasses.

For me LASIK was an amazing quality of life improvement, and while I didn't do it for the financial benefits it's certainly paid for itself a few times over 6 years later.

Edit: This is also completely ignoring the pita of keeping your glasses clean throughout the day. I know from experience most people aren't bothered by dirty glasses (ugh, this is super distracting in meetings for me) but I cannot stand it. I'll replace cheap sunglasses that get a single scratch on them it's so distracting to me.

Plus stuff like being able to do things like buy 10 pair of knockoff sunglasses for $15 vs. a $200 prescription set. Or being able to actually watch 3D movies that don't completely suck. Or go off-roading and wear a mask comfortably. Or go diving. The list goes on. For those who can't wear contacts, I can't imagine not getting LASIK if it were an option.

I was replying to the person who needs new glasses because of unstable vision and strictly from a financial perspective.

I know it's common for adults to change vision but usually once a year is a frequency more seen in children and teens. At least from my experience talking to people and being in an ophthalmologist chair since infancy. I was a frequent flyer at the ophthalmologist's office as a child (once a month was common for a while) and I had lots of questions.

EDIT: I haven't actually heard a lot about the elderly so I don't know their typical frequency of vision change. The only data point I have is a 60 year old I knew who got LASIK and was back in glasses in about 2 years.

On an unrelated note, I went to the same ophthalmologist for 20 years and it was eerie how it never changed. The ophthalmologist always looked the same, he always had the same staff and they looked the same, and the office didn't change. After a while it was like stepping into a time machine when I went there.

1 study back in ... 1953 / 1957 ? the technology of headlights really changed in the past 15 years not to mention 70.

For me, it cuts down on the amount of glare from those HIDs and maladjusted headlights.

"PURKINJE SHIFT" is the shift of frequencies that an dark adjusted eye is sensitive to; basically, a dark adjusted eye is more sensitive to blue.

Between the ages of 12-25 or so, my sight got progressively worse and I needed a new prescription roughly every year. For the next 15 years, my sight stabilized at -8.5. For the last few years, my prescription has decreased slowly (I'm -6.75 now, which is a little inconvenient).

Until I started wearing contacts, I got new lenses for my glasses every year.

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