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Understanding Cataracts

What are the risks involved with cataract surgery?

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Laura D. Cook
Assistant Professor of Opthalmology, University of Virginia-Department of Opthalmology
www.healthsystem.virginia.edu  
434-924-5485

The Ophthalmology Residency Training Program at the University of Virginia was separated from Otolaryngology in 1947. Since 1978, it has been under the leadership of a full-time academic faculty. The Department currently serves as the ophthalmic referral center for central and western Virginia and parts of West Virginia, North Carolina and eastern Tennessee.

What are the risks involved with cataract surgery?

The lens of your eye functions very much like the windshield of your car. Laura D. Cook, M.D., Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, explains how cataracts affect your vision.

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Host: What are the risks involved with cataract surgery?

Dr. Laura D. Cook: Even though cataract surgery is great, now it's very fast, it's quick, it's slick. People go home after surgery, they are not admitted and that there are very small risks associated. It is still surgery and that inherent in any type of surgical procedure, I like to tell patients that there is a risk and that's why, conservatively, I also tell patients that unless it's bothering them or unless if there is some medical indication that they really need to think about whether this is a procedure that they want to undergo. On the flip side, the risks are very small. The most devastating risk is vision loss or blindness from bleeding or infection and that's something that they need to discus with their doctor.

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