Crystalens AO™

Crystalens AO™ is an intraocular lens implant designed to replace the natural crystalline lens of the eye.  It differs from standard lens implants in that it can focus or "accommodate" like the natural lens of a young person.  This lens is used in two ways.  

First, it can be implanted at the time of standard cataract surgery in order to give the patient both distance and near vision without glasses following the procedure.  It can also be used to correct refractive errors, such as nearsightedness, farsightedness and astigmatism.  This is done in a procedure called refractive lens exchange or RLE in patients over 40 who want to not only correct their distance vision, but have good near vision as well.  Both of these groups, if implanted with standard lens implants, would have good distance vision, but would require reading glasses for all near activities.  

Both cataract surgery and RLE are performed in our state licensed, Medicare approved, AAAHC certified ambulatory surgery center.  These procedures are usually performed under oral sedation (sedative is given as a liquid by mouth) and topical (eye drop) anesthesia and take only about 10-15 minutes to complete.  It is virtually pain free and vision improves rapidly over the first 24 hours.  

Crystalens™ was developed here in the United States, but first released in Europe over 14 years ago, and has been FDA approved and implanted in the United States now for over 4 years.  This unique lens implant was designed to harness the natural focusing muscles inside the eye.  When you look at near objects, such as a cell phone, book or computer, the ciliary muscles inside your eye automatically contract.  This pulls the very thin and pliable Crystalens™ optic forward and also causes it to flex, both of which increase the power of the lens to help you see better at near.  This lens implant has gone through several upgrades since it’s first introduction, culminating with the newest version, Crystalens AO™.   This latest lens has an advanced optical profile in which the lens surface is aspheric (non-spherical) in which the lens is less steep in the middle and steeper in the peripheral (outside) portion of the lens.  This compensates for the normal cornea (outermost clear portion of the eye) which is steeper in the middle and flatter in the periphery.  The net effect is reduced "spherical aberration", a higher order cause for blurry vision and poor visual quality.  This helps to give clearer, sharper, higher quality vision and evenimproves low light vision by improving contrast sensitivity, which can help with activities such as night driving.  

Learn more about Crystalens AO™ at Crystalens.com