About cataract

Today I want to talk about cataract, I mean the medical condition of the eye, not the Cataracts of the Nile River, and it’s just because my wife recently underwent surgery for that condition early this month. If you are young and don’t care much about that condition, a cataract is the clouding of the eye's natural lens, which leads to blurred or cloudy vision. 

If left untreated, a cataract can progress to severe vision loss and, in the final stages, complete blindness. So the seriousness of the ailment explain why as early as the 6th century, Sushruta, an Indian surgeon was already credited with attempts to cataract surgery. 

In 1747, Jacques Daviel, surgeon-oculist the Kind of France, performed the first successful lens extraction in 1747. His pioneering technique, which involved making an incision to remove the clouded lens, laid the groundwork for modern cataract surgery. 

We then had to wait until 1949 for the English ophtalmologist Sir Harold Ridley to introduce the first artificial lens (IOL) for implantation after cataract extraction. In 1967, the American Charles Kelman: Introduced phacoemulsification, a technique still used today that uses ultrasonic waves to break up and remove the cataract. 

Finally, Thomas Mazzocco, another American, developed and implanted the first foldable IOL in 1985. Today, the best places for cataract surgery are widely recognized US hospitals, but Turkey, South Korea, the Czech Republic, and other Asian countries also offer top-tier options. 

Tomorrow, we’ll see how the procedure goes…