Laser & Refractive Eye Surgery

SAFETY & PRECISION WITH STATE OF THE ART TECHNOLOGY.

Modern laser eye surgery is a safe and effective way to free yourself from glasses and contact lens wear. Dr Gunn is an internationally trained cornea specialist with additional training in laser eye surgery endorsed by the Royal College of Ophthalmologists, United Kingdom. This means that he has special training in the treatment of short sightedness, long sightedness, astigmatism and presbyopia. Dr Gunn is focussed on achieving the pinnacle of safety, precision, professionalism and patient satisfaction.

LASER EYE SURGERY

Dr Gunn has access to the latest generation of excimer laser in Queensland, and the only one to be located in a private day hospital. This means your surgery will be performed in a facility that has undergone the rigorous accreditation required for a hospital. For therapeutic treatments (where there is an eye disease requiring laser), it is the only facility with an attached private health insurance rebate.

The system that is used to perform your laser offers the most recent eye tracking (1050 measurements per second) and customisable treatments including the advanced vision correction systems of Wavelight Plus and Contoura Vision ™. Contoura is a topography guided treatment that allows higher order abberations to be corrected - this means one third of patients have better vision after surgery than they had before in their glasses of contact lenses. Wavelight Plus is the newest form of LASIK technology in Queensland. It uses advanced diagnostic data and AI to create an eye model to caculate a treatment to correct as many eye aberrations as possible. Similar to Contoura (except more advanced), Wavelight Plus offers a new level of visual excellence and outcomes. There is also an option for a no touch technique where the entire treatment is performed without any blade or part of the laser touching your eye (transepithelial treatments).

HOW MUCH DOES LASER EYE SURGERY COST IN BRISBANE IN 2024?

Laser eye surgery is normally not covered by medicare or private health insurance. Some top level plans do offer a rebate, though usually not the whole cost. You will need to discuss this with your health fund directly. We will supply a formal quote after your assessment which you can provide to your insurer if required. There is no item number for refractive laser eye surgery.

The fees below includes the hospital admission, surgeon fee, the laser procedure, intraocular lenses and all follow up visits for the first year (inc. GST) and any laser enhancements that may be required for up to 2 years.

• TransPRK - Transepithelial Photorefractive Keratectomy - $3000 per eye

• LASIK - Laser Assisted In Situ Keratomileusis - $3750 per eye

• CLEAR - Lenticule Extraction - $4000 per eye

• Implantable Contact Lens Surgery - $6000 per eye

• Refractive Lens Exchange - $6000 per eye

There will be an out of pocket cost for your first assessment with Dr Gunn and for the drops that will be given to you after surgery by the private pharmacy.

IMPLANTABLE CONTACT LENS

Dr Gunn is a certified provider of implantable contact lens surgery. For patients with severe dry eye, thin corneas or high prescriptions, these lenses give great vision by putting the power of your glasses or contact lenses inside of the eye rather than via treatment with a laser. Patients like the fact that these lenses are removable if required. Read more about the Visian ICL ™. Watch Dr Gunn perform ICL surgery here.

REFRACTIVE LENS EXCHANGE

In some cases, the best option to improve your vision is replacement of your natural lens with the correct power lens. This procedure is called refractive lens exchange or often “RLE”. This is effectively the same operation as routine cataract surgery, except that it is performed when the lens in your eye is clear, rather than after it has become cloudy and called a cataract. For patients in the age range 55 and over RLE is usually the best choice, though it can be performed at a younger age. If there is cataract present and you have gold level health insurance, most of the cost of this procedure may be covered by medicare and the insurance rebate.

PRESBYOPIA CORRECTION

Once patients reach the age of 45-50, their ability to focus at near objects becomes reduced. Laser blended vision is a technique that can help significantly reduce the requirement for reading glasses. The concept is to set the dominant eye (usually the right eye for right handed people) for distance and the non-dominant eye for near vision. For most tasks you will not require glasses, but for extended reading or for very small text the use of reading glasses will be required. Many patients really like this arrangement after a period of adaptation. The effect can be trialed in contact lenses before surgery to see if it suits you. Many patients do this with their optometrist before coming to see Dr Gunn to make it permanent. Another option is the use of a multifocal lens implants that have multiple focal points at the same time: distance (driving vision), intermediate (computer distance) and near (phone or tablet).

WHICH TREATMENT IS RIGHT FOR ME?

Dr Gunn will assess your visual needs as well as the factors which make you eligible for certain procedures. He will provide you with a selection of treatment options designed to give the safest and most reliable results. For some patients there will be no good surgical option. At your assessment we will give you our honest medical opinion and would much rather advise no treatment than provide anything other than an excellent outcome.