Contoura LASIK is a type of refractive surgery that uses WaveLight LASIK technology to perform laser vision correction unique to your eyes. Many patients wonder if refractive surgery is safe, and the answer is yes. Refractive surgery has an impressive history of adaption and success. There are different types of refractive surgery, including LASIK and PRK.
Contoura Vision surgery is a topography-guided LASIK treatment performed in San Diego by LASIK surgeon Dr. Manoj Motwani. Contoura LASIK in San Diego For the first time ever, we can create eyes with a quality of vision better than the ones we were born with using custom LASIK surgery. For hundreds of years, we have corrected refractive errors such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism with glasses and, eventually, contact lenses.
For the last 20 years, we have used laser vision correction for this purpose. One procedure we specialize in at Cornea Revolution is Contoura Vision surgery. The refractive surgery community has become very good at Contoura LASIK, and laser technology has become so sophisticated that our results are excellent, peaking with the use of WaveLight EX500 and the WFO protocol.
We have always dreamed of making corneas “better than normal” and performing corrections that were superior to those made by glasses, soft contact lenses, or modifications made by conventional laser systems.
This Wavelight Contoura LASIK system requires the Topolyzer Vario analyzer, which takes the most detailed cornea map using 22,000 points of information to analyze any abnormalities or aberrations. The cornea is the clear front bubble of the eye that focuses most light in the eye, and it is responsible for focusing images onto the nerve layer of the retina, which then sends this information to the brain.
Any abnormality of the cornea will prevent a sharp, clear image from being focused on the retina, causing blurring of the vision. The information from the Topolyzer is sent to the WaveNet server, which analyzes the cornea, and then sends the information to the WaveLight EX500 excimer laser to direct treatment.
It also sends information using the pupil and the iris, ensuring that the laser aligns with the eye for a correction like it did on the Topolyzer analyzer.
We create flaps with Alcon WaveLight FS200 Femtosecond Laser or the Moria M2 Microkeratome, depending on the doctor’s choice or the patient’s wishes.
The Contoura system using the LYRA Protocol (an acronym for Layer Yolked Reduction of Astigmatism) — developed by Dr. Motwani in conjunction with Sissimos Lemonis of WaveLight GmbH — is a massive step in that direction: a revolution in laser vision correction.
When the FDA approved WaveLight Contoura, surgeons still needed to fully understand the information this powerful system provided. The FDA provided studies with an incomplete understanding of Contoura and how the optical system focuses light on the retina. This nerve layer transmits images to the brain for processing and to produce what we call vision.
Dr. Motwani developed a new theory of understanding this focusing system and demonstrated its effectiveness in multiple peer-reviewed publications. The United States Patent Office granted a patent for this procedure (European Patent Pending). The LYRA Protocol has reduced corneal flaws and distortions. It reduces the scattered light caused by halos and night glare, likely diminishing the necessary brain processing power to ignore these visual distortions.
The LYRA Protocol is different from normal Contoura. The results of our study show that 80.85% of participants*achieved vision of 20/15 or better by three months postoperatively. Over 60% of patients had already achieved 20/15 vision after one month, and results after six months (including enhancements) are even higher.
The FDA study only achieved 65% 20/15, and these were still the best results in an FDA study for a laser vision correction system. The LYRA protocol finally harnesses the true power of Contoura with an entirely new understanding of how the human cornea focuses light for vision.
*(50 eyes between -8.00 diopters of myopia and -3.00 diopters of astigmatism)
Even more striking was the lack of halos and night glare. Many patients noted within days that the lights at nighttime had minimal to no glow around them. Removing the biological distortions in the cornea reduces light scatter and reduces glare. When questioned if they had halos, some patients weren’t sure what to say because they didn’t know what a halo was! Dr. Motwani has published a peer-reviewed paper on subjective results utilizing a standardized survey from Johns Hopkins. The results showed minimal to no visual complaints across the spectrum of this qualitative survey, surprising even the authors.
Contoura with the LYRA Protocol system also shows a relatively low level of regression, with very few secondary procedures being necessary. Dr. Motwani followed a group of patients with very high levels of nearsightedness, and the resulting corneal smoothness is striking compared to the results of any preceding laser system.
The WaveLight Contoura topography-guided laser system is the most technologically advanced laser vision correction system in the United States. The LYRA Protocol takes this system even further by linking the Aberration Correction Layer (removal of the biological flaws in the cornea) with the Refractive Correction Layer (correction of nearsightedness and astigmatism). It achieves over 80% 20/15 vision results, even after, and outcomes after six months are even higher.