The Eye Laser Association (“ELA”) represents the companies that carry out the majority of the UK's eye laser treatments and its membership operates to its own Code of Practice to ensure the highest quality of service to patients. The ELA has prepared this briefing to clarify a number of issues raised as a result of interest surrounding the subject and, in particular, following the recent initial guidance on LASIK from NICE (The National Institute for Clinical Excellence). For more information click here.

Laser eye treatment does have a long and proven safety record. In the UK alone some 280,000 people in the UK have been treated since 1990 with extremely high levels of patient satisfaction. On a worldwide scale over 9 million LASIK procedures have been performed, with well over 1 million being performed annually. This makes LASIK the single most-performed elective surgical procedure in the world. This level of uptake is due to the treatment's success rates and effectiveness, for example 98% of all patients with mild to moderate levels of myopia will have their vision improved, from a single treatment, such that they meet or exceed the UK's driving standard for vision without wearing any correction (that is without glasses or contact lenses).

There has been some misreporting of the subject matter and this briefing addresses each of the issues where further clarification is needed. We should also like to extend an invitation to all those working in health reporting to visit one of our member's clinics where the procedures can be seen and any specific questions answered. If you should like to arrange a visit, please telephone 0113-218-3524.

The Eye Laser Association (“ELA”), which represents the companies that carry out the majority of the UK's eye laser treatments, today welcomed the report from NICE (The National Institute for Clinical Excellence) on LASIK and stress that LASIK has a long and proven safety record.

Tony Veverka, Chairman of the ELA, said: “We applaud the level of interest and awareness shown by NICE but we do wish to make it clear that, since 1990, some 280,000 people in the UK have been treated and we estimate that fewer than 0.1% have experienced persistent problems.

“LASIK is a life-enhancing treatment and we believe that it is a discretionary decision by an individual. We are puzzled why NICE should even be considering it as a function for the NHS, when the NHS currently funds a mere 5% of the cost of the Nation's glasses and contact lenses.

“We have achieved an outstanding level of clinical care in our industry and welcome the full systematic review proposed by NICE,” added Mr Neave.

Mr Sunil Shah MBBS FRCS(Ed) FRCOphth., Consultant Ophthalmic Surgeon at the Birmingham & Midland Eye Centre and President of the British Society for Refractive Surgery (“BSRS”), states that “The surgical element of LASIK has, in fact, been performed since the 1960's so there is extensive long term safety data available. I believe NICE has not looked at this evidence, as it was not written in English. Furthermore, much of the data it has sourced is out of date and, therefore, the effectiveness of the latest technology and techniques seems to have been ignored; this field changes so quickly that data which is published is often out of date by the time of publication. The refractive surgeons themselves are happy with the long term data and, in testament to this, a large number of them have undergone the procedure themselves.”

The ELA also welcomes the Parliamentary Panel's call for further regulation. The ELA's members already practice the vast majority of the recommendations and look forward to all providers adopting many of the same rigours and protocols observed by ELA members. We also look forward to working closely with the Royal College and other interested parties in developing the sector's standards going forward.