Cataract Surgery

Treatment for cataracts is among the oldest medical procedures in recorded history. Derived from the Greek word for waterfall, cataracts (which were first thought to stem from opaque material flowing, like a waterfall, over the eye) were treated as early as the 5th century BC in a procedure known as couching, wherein a prone patient's eyes were struck with a blunt object, which caused the hardened material of cataracts to break up and recede into the eye's vitreous cavity. Instruments from the Bronze Age developed centuries later indicate that similar dislocation of cataract material was accomplished as early as the 1st century AD using sharp tools inserted into the eye to break up cataract deposits.

Modern surgery to actually remove a cataract from the eye dates to 1748, when the advent of topical anesthetics began to make such a procedure more practical, though it was not until the development of intraocular lenses in the 1940s that cataract patients could expect anything approaching comfortable or practical rehabilitation of their post-surgery vision. In the late 1950s procedures to enzymatically dissolve cataract material appeared, with emulsification using ultrasonic vibrations following a decade or so later. Ultrasonic emulsification with aspiration (suctioning) of the dissolved material remains the preferred treatment in cataract removal today.

Improvements in cataract surgery and the success of its corresponding results have been frankly phenomenal during the past 30 years. The evolution of techniques to employ smaller surgical incisions has been matched by the development of new lens implants created out of materials such as acrylic and silicone. Today cataracts can be removed through wounds approaching 1mm in size and intraocular lenses utilizing aspheric lens technology correct not only focal length vision, but also address Corneal aberrations that occur naturally due to aging, raising hopes of restoring quality distance and near vision without the need for glasses.