By Verne Maree
Issue 94 - May 2010

EVENT UPDATE:

Learn more about NeuroLASIK™ as Dr. Jerry Tan explains how LASIK results can be optimised by training your brain to see clearer and sharper images. Improve your chance of seeing perfect vision or better after LASIK.

Date: Saturday, 22 May 2010
Time: 1.30pm - 4pm
Venue: Camden Medical Centre, #10-06
Fee: $10*

Call 6333 6457 or visit www.jerrytan.com to register.
*Includes light refreshments, $10 Pharmaplus gift certificate and $20 The Optique voucher

Is it possible to achieve vision that is better than 20/20 – more perfect than perfect? Pioneer and veteran of LASIK in Singapore DR JERRY TAN says yes – with a ground-breaking new approach called NeuroLASIK.


So committed is Jerry to this approach that he recommends it for all his LASIK surgery patients. That includes me, as I plan to become one of them very soon. 

VM: What is NeuroLASIK?
JT: It is the combination of the latest in Advanced Customised LASIK with NeuroVision, an amazing technology that is clinically proven to improve your visual acuity by enhancing your contrast sensitivity function, or CSF.

Vision is a function of optics (what we do to the eye) and brain activity. The eye does not work alone; it works with the brain: the brain is an integral part of vision. What we are doing with NeuroLASIK is applying the very best LASIK technology and then following it with the NeuroVision programme to train the brain.

With Standard LASIK – which I no longer offer – many patients lose contrast sensitivity, and even with the Advanced Customised LASIK technology that I use, some patients lose up to 3 percent of CSF. Adding the NeuroVision programme to the treatment makes up for any shortfall, without fail.

VM: To a seriously myopic person like me, 3 percent doesn’t sound like very much. Just being able to read the numbers on the bus would be nice.
JT: Our goal with LASIK is to achieve perfect vision: 20/20, also known as 6/6, depending whether you are talking feet or metres. Unlike you, many patients would not be satisfied with anything less.

If there is a small residual error, improving contrast perception will make up the gap and enable perfect vision.  And even if we can give you perfect vision through LASIK alone, we still recommend that you do the NeuroVision programme after surgery.

VM: What is different about NeuroVision?
JT: Unlike optical treatments – glasses, contact lenses and refractive surgery, which alter the refraction of light so that the image is focused on the retina – NeuroVision treatment acts on the brain. It trains the brain to better interpret the signal it receives from the optic nerve, so that a sharper, brighter image is received.

What’s more, it involves no surgery, no medication and no appliances, and is completely free of risk.

VM: You say that NeuroVision works by improving our perception of contrast. Why is contrast so important?
JT: Your ability to perceive contrast has a major effect on your visual acuity.  We can see this principle at work in the difference between plasma and LED televisions. It’s not the sharpness of the image that makes the new LED TVs better than the older plasma ones: it’s the enhanced contrast that they offer. Colours are brighter, shadows are reduced.

Studies have shown that athletes and Top Gun pilots, for example, for whom 20/20 vision or more is essential, tend to have higher-than-average CSF. And studies on the effectiveness of NeuroVision on airline pilots: some of them improved their vision from 20/20 to 20/15 and even 20/12. 

VM: How much improvement in my eyesight can I expect to achieve from NeuroVision?
JT: Patients consistently improve their vision by a full two lines on the eye chart – and that’s a significant result. The same goes for everyone, no matter how good or bad their eyesight is. Every person will benefit.

VM: That’s almost incredible. What do I have to do, and how long does it take?
JT: We like our LASIK patients to start NeuroVision a month after surgery. It’s an internet-based programme of 30 to 40 half-hour sessions; all you need is a computer and a dark room. After doing the first two orientation sessions here, you can choose either to carry on coming in for them, or you can do them at home – at least twice a week is advised.

A session involves looking at series of small images on the screen and hitting a mouse button to choose for a particular factor, such as clarity, flicker or contrast. The exercise works by stimulating specific networks of neurons in the visual cortex.

VM: How will I know that I’m doing it right and making progress?
JT: The programme is fully personalised for you, and we continuously monitor your progress from our office. Each time you log on for a session, be it here or at home, your input is fully recorded.

Depending on your performance each time, we will tweak the next session to ensure that it has just the right level of difficulty for you at that point: neither too easy to be effective nor so difficult that you become frustrated. And where necessary, we will send you comments for encouragement and guidance.

Twice a week is the minimum, but you could do it as often as every other day, if you liked. Motivation is key: a highly motivated patient can improve good vision to excellent vision, or excellent vision to superhuman vision!





Jerry Tan Eye Surgery is at Camden Medical Centre #10-06. Call +65 6738 8122. www.jerrytan.com