Treating the elderly with heart problems: Seizing the best time for cataract surgery

The human eye is like a camera. The lens is the lens and the fundus is the film. If the lens is blurry, the photo will be blurry. Similarly, if the lens is cloudy, our vision will be blurry. The cloudy lens is known as "cataract".

Cataracts are very common among the elderly. According to statistics, the incidence of cataracts exceeds 60% among people over 60 years old, and the incidence rate among people over 80 years old is as high as 100%. Therefore, cataracts need to be paid special attention to by the elderly.

The main symptoms of cataracts are blurred vision, double vision, and light sensitivity. More light is needed for reading, and bright colors in the eyes of ordinary people will fade or turn yellow in the eyes of cataract patients. As the disease progresses, the patient's vision will be significantly reduced, causing symptoms such as foggy vision, glare, and even double vision. When cataracts develop to the middle and late stages, the patient's vision will be more significantly reduced, and may even cause blindness.

There are many causes of cataracts, including heredity, radiation, trauma, metabolism, malnutrition, etc., but the most important one is aging. When we are over 40 years old, the normal protein in the lens of the eye begins to decompose, making the originally clear lens cloudy. After the age of 60, the lens opacity becomes more obvious, and vision loss and difficulty in seeing things also follow.

Currently, the main way to treat cataracts is surgery. Ophthalmologists remove the cloudy lens in the eye and replace it with an artificial lens, allowing the patient to see clearly again. However, in clinical practice, many patients still have questions: Do we need to wait until we are about to go blind before we can have cataract surgery?

In fact, this was said 30 years ago. Currently, the most popular procedure for cataracts is phacoemulsification, where doctors use a surgical incision of 3 mm or less to crush and suck out the cloudy lens, and then insert a transparent artificial lens. This surgical technique is already very mature. If cataract patients wait until they are about to go blind to undergo surgery, on the one hand, they will have to endure a fairly long period of low vision, which will greatly reduce their quality of life; on the other hand, during the waiting process, they may develop complications of cataracts, such as glaucoma, uveitis, or other complications of overmature cataracts, leading to serious risks.

In a bright world, seeing is believing. When the vision of cataract patients drops to between 0.3 and 0.6, it is the best time to undergo surgery. Therefore, cataract patients should seize the treatment opportunity to obtain the best postoperative vision correction effect.