FDA Results Favor VISX S4 among San Francisco Wavefront LASIK Lasers
There are three, FDA approved lasers in the Wavefront LASIK San Francisco market: the Alcon LADARVision 4000, the Bausch & Lomb Tehnolas 217Z, and the VISX S4.
Most patients in the San Francisco Wavefront LASIK (aka Custom LASIK in San Francisco) market assume that the performance of these three lasers is the same. That's like saying the performance of supercomputers built by IBM, Hitachi, and HP is the same. They're not (IBM is the leader), for the same reason that VISX is the leader in the San Francisco Custom LASIK marketplace: these systems may be based on standard algorithms and components, but they're engineered differently.
San Francisco Wavefront LASIK Patients Expect 20/20 or Better Results
As a San Francisco Custom LASIK patient, you don't care much about the engineering of lasers in the San Francisco Wavefront LASIK market: you care primarily about visual outcomes. Then consider the percentage of patients during the FDA clinical trails for Wavefront treatment who achieved 20/20 or better outcomes, by laser:
- 79% for Alcon LADARVision 4000
- 91% for Bausch & Lomb Technolas 217Z
- 95% for VISX S4
If your Wavefront LASIK surgeon in San Francisco contests these results, you can tell her to visit www.fda.gov/cdrh/LASIK/lasers.htm, where she can download the FDA Wavefront approval letters for each laser manufacturer, citing the 20/20 or better data above.
