A new treatment has successfully changed the color of people's eyes in Latin America, but the procedure isn't approved in the U.S. yet.
For years, a California-based company called Stroma Medical has been publicizing a laser procedure that turns brown eyes blue. Theoretically, this would give brown-eyed individuals the choice to change the tint of their irises, not unlike the way many decide to use surgery to alter the noses or chests they were born with.
Now Stroma Medical claims that it has conducted 37 successful treatments on patients in Mexico and Costa Rica. It also says that it would likely charge about $5,000 for anyone wanting the procedure. That is, of course, only if and when American medical safety regulators give the surgery the green light in the United States.
Company chairman Gregg Homer says the procedure works by disturbing the thin layer of pigment that exists on the surfaces of all brown irises.
“The fundamental principle is that under every brown eye is a blue eye,” Homer told CNN. “If you take that pigment away, then the light can enter the stroma—the little fibers that look like bicycle spokes in a light eye—and when the light scatters it only reflects back the shortest wavelengths and that’s the blue end of the spectrum.”
Although the treatment lasts only 20 seconds, the patient’s eye color isn’t changed right away. Instead, it takes a few weeks for the human body to remove the pigmented tissue, resulting in blue eyes.
Given that light eyes are increasingly rare, with less than a fifth of Americans boasting blue peepers, it’s easy to see how there might be demand for this procedure. A preference for blue eyes in Western societies has been documented in many unscientific ways, though controlled studies suggest that the blue-eyes-are-more-attractive stereotype is more a product of culture than unconscious preference.
Whether or not you feel this procedure is a net good—or bad—thing for society, a bigger concern might be safety.
Though Stroma claims the surgery is safe, at least one ophthalmologist cautioned that the shedding of pigment could clog up drainage channels in the eye, increasing pressure and the risk for glaucoma.
It seems likely that this surgery, like Lasik, will lead to some undesirable and perhaps irremediable eye problems for patients later.
Plastic surgery can be mitigated generally. Eyes are more irreplaceable. Lasik often fails in only a few years, leaving patients with eyes that are harder to treat and that cannot be corrected again. Here is a website, relying mostly on reports from doctors (including eye doctors) who report problems with their own Lasik procedures and their patients.
Even so, I think you'll see lots of people line up for this procedure and they'll travel outside the country for it if it isn't approved here. Like brown-eyed women who like to dye their hair blonde. Finally they can be blonde-haired-blue-eyed Aryan beach bunny types.
Homo's, of course, would have to pay a 1/3 more...
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
One messes with the natural state of one's body at his (her) own peril. I've little doubt this will result in perm injury/blindness for some percentage, even if small/tiny. And long term side effects are another gamble.
Yep, my wife had LASIK done, and within 3 years, she needed glasses. Procedure was $5,000 dollars, and took one minute. Am sure the machines are quite expensive, but at that price, am sure they were payed off in no time. There were 8 other people having this done at same time, ka-ching!
Yep, my wife had LASIK done, and within 3 years, she needed glasses.
She was part of the lucky majority.
For a small number, they end up almost blind with hideous bulging eyeballs. This can happen short-term or years later. The only "cure" is corneal transplants.
