My Lasik Experience at Shinagawa - 1 Month In

Chronicling my lasik experience to pay it forward... To all the many bloggers/forum-mers/redditors who helped with my "lasik experience review" Google queries!

I've suffered from myopia from a young age (P3!) and thought it would be my affliction forever, till tons of my peers started going for lasik and making this their theme song. Was fearful but decided that the pros will far outweigh any cons.

In my selection of the clinic that will cut my eyes open, I decided finally on Shinagawa Eye Centre (to be honest I didn't 'shop' around much anyway). Wanted to go with Eagle Eye Centre by Dr. Julian Theng, who might be the most popular eye surgeon around, but I submitted my query online to zero reply (till today!). Was too impatient so I decided to switch to another seemingly well reviewed, and respected clinic. TL;DR - no complaints!

So anyway, a bit about myself — my vision has more or less stabled at 24 years old with -3.75 on the left, and -4.00 on the right. Astigmatism on both eyes.

The Consultation

The first experience and judgement of Shinagawa Eye Centre was pretty good. Area felt modern and luxe — enough assurance to give them my eyeballs. They ushered me from machine to machine for about an hour to determine whether I am a suitable candidate for lasik. Nothing painful at this moment! Just they did poke my eyeballs with some tool (after they put numbing drops haha).

Then I was quickly ushered into the room to meet Dr Lee Sao Bing for a consultation where he confirmed that I am a suitable candidate for IntraLase Lasik with a hefty cornea thickness (yay!). My thoughts on him? A nice guy with a friendly smile, but he's a salesman la haha with his kind demeanor he started rapping a script that he must have recited a few thousand times over about the risks of lasik and what will happen. Very fast paced, to say the least. But good, still good. The doctor did warn me about my dry eyes and told me to put tons of drops in the mean time.

And there and then, I was ushered out to pay for my pre-surgical drops and book the actual surgery date. I was very kanchiong and booked it within the week! Thumbs up for that expedition.

The prices? Not too bad. Slightly over $4k for a pre-op consultation, the actual surgery, three post-op consultations (1 day, 1 week and 1 month mark) and some relevant medication. I've heard a friend paying more at a public hospital so I'm glad.

Disclaimer that I ended up paying more though, because of all the additional drops and other add ons. But to be honest, after paying $4,000, it became extremely easy to open my wallet for another few hundred dollars worth of bills 🤷 I recommend setting aside about $4.5k to be safe?

The Actual Surgery

Heard that they recommend the surgeries to be done in the morning (so that you have the entire rest of the day to rest), so I booked mine at around 9am. Had to pop by 15 minutes earlier for all payment, forms and other stuff. Was pretty nervous at this stage, but in retrospect it wasn't that bad.

Firstly, they drugged me with a very tiny pill to calm myself down (not sure if it had any effect), and numbed my eyes with quite a fair bit of numbing drops. One of my fears was if the anestheisa wasn't 'sufficient' and it started hurting midway through the surgery haha but they really did flood both my eyes with a lot of drops, and checked in a few times to ensure that I've really lost all feeling. Then they put in a few more drops for safe measure. That calmed my irrational fear.

Then I was ushered into the surgical station which did feel creepily sterile, and they began by creating the corneal flap. That was a very simple procedure though they did clamp my eyes open with some plastic thing (all the pressure felt very strange). Stare at a green light, and within half a minute I was all done. My eyes were blurred and I was told to sit somewhere for the 'bubbles beneath my corneal flap to dissipate'. That was a fair bit of waiting in a quiet room, but not much discomfort at this stage.

The nurse came by a few times to reassure me on some of the steps, and thereafter was the actual LASIK surgery. It was pretty surreal seeing them pull apart my corneal flap (I don't want to know what they did with that), and seeing my world turn mostly black apart from this green blinking light which I was told at all times to keep my eye on. Then they did the cutting (didn't smell any burning scent that people talk about because I was too busy holding my breath and holding myself still haha) and it was all good. Oh! One good part was the nurses around who were whispering to my ear very gently what to do (e.g., "Keep your eyes on the light for 15 seconds") and it did comfort me a bit.

I sound very flippant about the entire experience because it really was that fuss free. The actual time on the surgical bed was probably about 10 minutes? The waiting before, during, and after, brought it to about an hour.

After the Surgery

My eyes were very blurry at that stage without any discomfort or particular sensitivity to light. I was told to keep my eyes closed as much as possible for the corneal flap to settle so that's what I did. Kept it closed throughout the rest of the day and listened to audio books/music to kill time. They also kept me on a variety of drops almost every hour!

I was warned that the anesthesia will fade and will cause a fair bit of discomfort. Thankfully, right when it started stinging I felt immensely tired and slept through it all. Once I woke, it was all good! Within the night I had functional vision. Not perfect, but functional.

Post-Op Day 1: Had the post-op checkup for the doctor to ensure my eyes are all in place. He also removed the bandage contact lenses (which I paid extra for, for my sad dry eyes) there and then. My vision was mostly good at this point. My eyes were dry!

Post-Op Week 1: Felt that I had pretty amazing vision at this point (though the nurse told me I had residual degree on my right eye). Doctor still updated that it was dry, despite me putting lubricating drops nearly every hour. So he upped it to include some lubricating gels, which were to be applied 4 times a day. They really make such a difference to how my eyes feel!

At this point, I can resume exercising (no impact sports though!) and eye makeup. FYI, I abstained from all makeup till this point. Even after that, I stayed off powdered makeup for about another 2 weeks.

Oh, and those creepy blood shot eyes? They stayed with me for about 1.5 weeks.

Post-Op Month 1: My vision was nearly perfect as it was 2 days after the surgery, though I still experience starbursts (I experienced it before my lasik anyway so wasn't too concerned). The only real symptoms were dryness of eyes (which were confirmed by the doctor, and were largely expected due to having dry eyes even prior to the procedure) but I'm not too concerned. I have perfect eyesight now! But this problematic dry eyes meant that the doctor booked me in for another consultation on month 2, which I wasn't expecting. Not too fussed about it though — the consultations were a quick in-and-out kind of thing.

Overall Thoughts

So far it's been the best thing I've ever done! Not having to deal with spectacles or the cumbersome contact lenses is a whole new world indeed. I'm hoping that the dry eyes will improve more (I'm currently on a 'drops every 2 hours + gel 4 times a day' routine) but I'm not too fussed.

Happy happy!