For people born with normal vision, light passes through the cornea and focuses directly on the retina at the rear of the eye, producing clear vision.
If you wear contact lenses or glasses, you’re physically unable to focus light on your retina. You have a vision error, typically genetically determined.
There are three primary vision errors, each the result of an eye shape that differs specifically from that of a normal eye. These errors include nearsightedness (myopia), farsightedness (hyperopia), and astigmatism.
A fourth error, called presbyopia, causes a loss of reading vision, for which a laser vision correction technique, called monovision, can compensate.
In an astigmatic eye, the cornea — the clear outer dome of the eye — is misshapen, causing light to scatter and focus at multiple locations in the eye, distorting your vision (see animation below).
Dr. Hyver can use either LASIK or PRK to correct astigmatism. He does so by applying the laser to smooth the shape of your cornea, to make it symmetrical, thereby resolving the light’s multiple focal points into a single point on your retina, producing clear vision.
If you also suffer from nearsightedness or farsightedness, Dr. Hyver will simultaneously correct these errors when he corrects your astigmatism.
