No way, says Dr. Robert Davis, an Oak Lawn, Illinois, optometrist who chairs the American Optometric Association contact lens section. And eye surgery won't ever be perfect for everyone. Spectacle and contact lens wearers still vastly outnumber those with surgically altered eyes. Materials used in contact lenses have improved vastly from the early days when lenses were so rigid they sometimes popped out with a quick turn of the head. Newer materials are softer, more pliable, and allow much more oxygen transmission across the lens into the cornea.
Lenses are more comfortable and less irritating.
Soft bifocal contact lenses, which have been available for years but not widely used, have also improved, says Dr. Bob Lee, an assistant professor of optometry at the Southern California College of Optometry, Fullerton, California. They're still not perfect, especially for correcting the lack of near-focusing ability that accompanies middle age. They might not work well, he says, if you're trying to read the menu in a restaurant with poor lighting. The cost is not much greater than getting a single pair, Lee says, because the bulk of expense is in fitting and follow-up, not in making a few more pairs of the same prescription. Daily disposable lenses are becoming more common.