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Does retinal laser cause ocular migraine?

I had rd surgery in January with Scleral buckle and vitrectomy with C3F8 gas. I had 20/20 uncorrected going in and am now at 20/800 uncorrected 20/40 corrected. Any chance this will improve? I also had laser in my other eye for a tear at the same time. I’ve had several occurrences of “jagged lights” in my vision the last few days. Those last about 45 minutes. In the lasered eye I also have 15-30 arc flashes that move from my peripheral to the center of vision. My surgeon says things are healing well and that the jagged lights are probably ocular migraine. I’ve never had these before and obviously with the other eye detachment..are creating a lot of anxiety.
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233488 tn?1310693103
MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL
Retinal detachment surgery is huge surgery and each case different. It is not possible to generalize. Your best source of information comes from your surgeon. Often 'only time will tell' and it takes 6 months or more to get the final result.  Laser and this type of surgery and the underlying conditions like vitreous traction and posterior vitreous detachments often cause flashes of light but generally very bright and very short duration, think flash of lightening at midnight.   So your description of a light flashing continually for 45 minutes is not typical of retina problem. This surgery does not cause migraine but in migraine patients can be a trigger for an acute migraine to occur. You should discuss with your surgeon.
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Thank you dr! I have an appointment with him next week and he said it should be ok to wait..with the daily arcs of light for about two months..starting a week or so after my laser..and now this..it just feels like I’m heading backwards down the road to recovery! Having both eyes affected..it feels like there will never be peace or normalcy again.
If you will use the search feature and pull up previous discussions about retinal detachment surgery you will find many people feel the same as you do.  Also with the eye that had RD if you still have gas in eye that will blur the vision until its gone or removed.
I will try that, thank you! The gas lasted 9 weeks and a day..it’s been gone about a month now. I can see when I squint! My surgeon said the buckle will make me “more nearsighted” ...but going from 20/20 to not even being able to correct to 20/20 seems odd! And my rx is -3 now which I guess isn’t even that strong. I’m super thankful to have found this group. I feel like I’ve read every last article I could find on Google...
If you surgeon said the RD operation would make you more myopic then that means he/she did a 'scleral buckle" which makes the eye longer and thus my myopic. If you squint and that clears it then glasses or contacts or lasik will be able to improve your vision for that blurry that is refractive/myopic/astigmatism.   If you are myopic your near vision in the RD eye should be relatively good much better than distance.
That’s correct..I had scleral buckle..I see well super close but anything past half an arm length is like falling off a cliff. I’m an airline pilot so I have to be 20/20 corrected in each eye and I can’t seem to get past 20/40..I’m at 13 weeks so I can only hope time will get me to 20/20. I had 20/20 before uncorrected...seems like the  20/800 isn’t even in the same ballpark!
After all the dust settles and things are stable, it might be possible to do a lasik on the RD eye to correct the eye if you need 20/20 without glasses.   Discuss with your surgeon. At some point the retina surgeon needs to refer you to a cornea/refractive surgery surgeon.
If you have lasik or wear contact for distance in RD eye the near vision will get worse. Did they remove your natural lens?  The type of surgery you have virtually always causes cataracts to form, sometimes relatively soon. Also what is your age?
Thanks Dr! I am 44... female. I am allowed to wear glasses and/or (a) contact. I’ve had my eyes refracted twice and am still at 20/40 best corrected for now. I still have my natural lens. I was told about the cataract..but my surgeon says the positioning went well and it’s insignificant so far...I have the contact for distance obviously and I have noticed it makes the near vision worse..but my other eye is 20/20 near and far so I can still see close with it in the rd eye. (As long as these arc lights don’t turn into something in that eye too! : (
So I come from a flying family, my father was a commercial pilot, I was in the USAF and for years I did the eye exams for the Marine/Navy flight school candidates.   Even without all the problems you have had at 44 you would soon be wearing reading glasses to see in dim light or sustained reading, it is called presbyopia and it catches up with all of us sooner or later. Good luck.
Awesome! Thanks for all the help!
Your welcome.
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