On Aug 30, 7:51 pm, Emily wrote:
Not a directly piloting question, but it certainly affects it.

My second class medical expires in December, so panic is starting to
set in.

I have bad eyes. Theoretically correctable to 20/20, but in reality,
toric contact lenses aren't much better than a piece of plastic in my
eye. My correction is so strong that it's difficult for me to drive
with glasses, and don't ask me to land a plane with them. So far I've
managed to hang onto my second class by sticking my finger in my eye
and manually rotating the lens before the test. I'm worried my AME is
going to start having issues with this.

I've seen two doctors in an attempt to get this taken care of, but
they both recommended LASIK (I'm not even a candidate). The
prevailing opinion seems to be that since I'm not flying for a living
(part time CFI and fly for CAP) that I don't need 20/20 vision and can
take the risks associated with the surgery. I actually had one guy
explain to me that "needing 20/20 vision to be a pilot is a myth -
don't let it stop you if you really want to learn to fly!"

Has anyone experiences this kind of treatment? Am I being unrealistic
to expect help in getting 20/20 vision? I have a third opinion
scheduled for next month - how do I make the doctor understand how
important this is?

(and yes, I'm aware I don't even need a medical to instruct, but CAP
requires it and frankly I'm tired of living in an astigmatism-blurred
world)

Emily,

I had severe myopia (20/250 or so) and a 5 diopters of asytmatism. I
was corrected to 20/20 with contact lenses, but decided to do PRK
(photo-refractive keratotomy, the pre-cursor to lasik) in late 1995.
This form of laser surgery removes material from the the surface of
your cornea and does not leave a scar, unlike Lasik. PRK is approved
by the U.S. Air Force for military pilots. My sister had the
procedure done a couple months before I did it with great results. We
both went to the Broadway Eye Center in Vancouver B.C. since it wasn't
approved yet in the USA.

My vision has been 20/15 every since my eyes completely healed
following the procedure (takes a couple of months for the epithelium
to grow back, with steroidal eye drops).

It was worth every penny of the $4000 I spent on it.

Dean