Pain After Cataract Surgery

Your cataract surgery recovery ought to be short and uneventful, as long as your health readies and you do not have other significant eye problems. But if you have pain after the cataract surgery procedure lasts more than expected by your surgeon – it is a time to follow up with the issue.

Uncomplicated cataract surgery typically takes not than about 10 minutes to perform. However immediately after the surgery, you will need to rest in a recovery area until you are less dazed from sedation or anesthesia. Normally this takes about 30 minutes to an hour.

How to Decrease Pain and Complications after Cataract Surgery

After surgery to remove a cataract:

• Use eyedrops as prescribed by your doctor. Wash your hands prior to putting drops in your eye. Be careful not to touch your eye with your hands or the idea of the medicine dropper.
• Protect your eye. Do not rub or push it. You may need to wear a rigid shield over your eye.
• You can use an over-the-counter painkiller such as acetaminophen (Tylenol). Be safe with medications.
• Read and follow all instructions on the label. It is common to have a scratchy sensation in the operated eye and pain or pain in the jaw on the operated side. If pain is not relieved, contact your doctor immediately. Pain may suggest complications.
• Alert your doctor if you have loss of vision, queasiness, vomiting, extreme coughing, or pain in the eye. These might be signs of a problem from the surgery.
• Watch for signs of infection (soreness, pain, and swelling) in the eye.

The day after surgery, you will most likely be allowed to return to your normal activities. But you have to take specific preventative measures:

• Use your glasses or sunglasses when you are outdoors.
• Do not get anything in the eye from which the cataract was gotten rid of.
• Thoroughly clean around the eye from which the cataract was eliminated. Use warm water and do not use soap. It is normal to have some drain around the eye.
• Do not let water run over your eye or into your face. Shampoo your hair by leaning your head back.
• Do not swim for about 3 weeks.

It is normal to have actually blurred vision after surgery. More than likely you will need to use glasses to have clear vision.

Contact your doctor without delay if you discover any signs of complications following cataract surgery, such as:

• Reducing vision.
• Increasing pain.
• Increasing soreness.
• Swelling around the eye.
• Any discharge from the eye.
• Any new floaters, flashes of light, or modifications in your field of view.

Continued Pain After Cataract Surgery Case

Question: My dad had cataract surgery on his right eye several months earlier and continues to experience pain in his eye. The doctor only prescribes more drops and painkillers. The pain went away after two months throughout of about a week, however has since returned. This has been a dreadful experience for him as he is in substantial discomfort when awake and is forced to sleep for much of the day. What could the causes be and what should my daddy’s next strategy be?

Answer from seeking advice from cataract surgeon: This person most absolutely has a very serious eye issue, which would need aggressive measures to maintain her vision, and sadly, these measures come with prospective side effects. All those questions ready ones and ones she need to certainly direct to her surgeon/treating physician.

I have to state, the findings/symptoms she is describing are possible after impacts of intraocular surgery (pain, pupil size, eye not opening (which I assume is ptosis), but she ought to specifically validate this with her surgeon. It is likewise true that eye medications (drops) she would use after a surgery like that or to treat her eye pressure and inflammation can cause pupil size modifications and ptosis, so once again, essential concerns for the surgeon/treating physician.

What Others Say

Mike: I also have pain 2 years later. I had laser cataract surgery and think the dr damaged my eyeball itself, possibly nerve damage. The 4 dr’s I have seen blame it on dry eye. I know the distinction. My vision is great and I never ever had any infections that were identified. I stress that eventually my sight will be impacted. I have not had the other eye done yet. My next step is an ophthalmic neurologist.

Steven: I have was diagnosed with Punctate Inner Chiroidopathy (PIC) nearly 3 years earlier. I was having injections of avastin every 6-8 weeks. If I went longer than that, there would be brand-new bleeds and scarring. So my dr did a steroid implant in my eye which triggered glaucoma and cataract. I was put on a series of eye drops to reduce the pressure which did not work.They took the implant out 6 weeks after putting it in. I was back at square one. My retina professional described another expert because all the treatments I was on was not decreasing the progression. This new doctor said that the factor that the treatments were not working was due to the fact that I had Seriginous Chiroiditis which resembles PIC however more aggressive. The brand-new Dr decided to put in a glaucoma valve, take out the cataract, put in a synthetic lens and a steroid implant once again. This remained in January 2016. Here it is, May and I get bad migraines, my eye feels like it does not have the full series of movement, it aches, the pupil because eye is bigger than the “good eye”, and my eye doesn’t open as much as the good eye. Could this be aside effect of all the surgical treatments they did at the same time? I saw a couple other postings stating they have pain which it is not normally normal. I just wasn’t sure if it was due to the fact that of all the important things that have been done to my eye in such a brief about of time.

Rudy: I had cataract surgery in both eyes practically two years ago. The right eye was implanted with a ‘basic’ lens and has actually recuperated well. The left eye was implanted with a Toric lens, for better vision. The Toric lens works very well, better than the ‘basic’ lens implanted in the right eye. Nevertheless, while the right eye has actually recuperated, the left eye continues to bother me after practically a complete year. Any kind of moderate pressure, such as when washing the face and lightly touching the closed eye, will result in a low threshold pain in the eyeball. Sometimes it feels as if the pain lags the eye. This pain normally continues for an hour or so after starting. The surgeon has done comprehensive, in office, assessments of the eye and can not figure out the cause. Recently had me undergo a carotid artery scan to make sure there is normal blood circulation to the head – and there was the necessary flow. I have a subsequent visit next week with the surgeon. It appears to me to be some sort of nerve problem? Certainly he does not think so. Thought I ‘d share this information for the advantage of others that may be experiencing comparable problems.