Is Using Lasers on Eye Gunk Worth It?

January 30,2007 | FALLS CHURCH, Va. -- Some people call them floaters. Eye doctors call them "vitreous opacities." Emily Flynn called hers "a little fuzzball," and she flew halfway around the world to have it removed. After more than 100 pinpoint zaps from a laser beam during a half-hour visit to a northern Virginia office park, the fuzzball was gone, obliterated within the clear, gelatinous goo that fills the eyeball.

The surgeon, John Karickhoff, has done the same procedure more than 1,400 times over the past 15 years and claims a success rate of better than 90 percent, with minimal risk of complications. Still, many ophthalmologists have never heard of the procedure -- and most would recommend against it. The procedure has drawn regulatory scrutiny in Florida.