Taylor Swift has been open about having LASIK eye surgery, and by her own account, the results have been excellent.

Her LASIK first became public knowledge in 2019, when Jimmy Fallon surprised her on The Tonight Show with a funny video her mother recorded shortly after her laser eye surgery. Years later, Swift referenced her vision again while discussing the Eras Tour on the New Heights podcast, saying that she could clearly see the people in the audience and adding, “I’ve got LASIK. I have incredible vision.”

Taylor Swift’s successful LASIK experience recently became the subject of renewed attention after Health Digest published an article examining Taylor Swift’s LASIK surgery and some of the potential risks and side effects associated with LASIK.

And that raises an important point:

LASIK can provide excellent vision for many people. But not every patient has the same experience.

At Global Complex Eye Care in Baltimore, we evaluate and treat patients who continue to experience LASIK side effects and LASIK complications, including dry eye, glare, halos, starbursts, ghosting, double vision, fluctuating vision, and difficulty seeing at night.

Some patients come to us months after LASIK. Others have struggled with their vision for years or even decades.

Many symptoms immediately following LASIK are temporary and improve as the eyes heal. However, some patients continue experiencing problems months or even years after their procedure.

Potential post-LASIK symptoms and complications can include:

• Dry eye after LASIK
• Glare after LASIK, particularly from headlights and bright lights
• Halos around lights
• Starbursts after LASIK
• Ghost images or double vision
• Blurry or fluctuating vision
• Difficulty seeing or driving at night
• Reduced contrast sensitivity
• Light sensitivity
• Poor-quality vision despite seeing “20/20” on an eye chart

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recognizes dry eye, glare, halos, starbursts, ghosting and difficulty with night vision as potential problems following LASIK.

Importantly, a patient can technically have excellent visual acuity on a standard eye chart and still be unhappy with the quality of their vision after LASIK.

Standard eyeglass prescriptions primarily measure lower-order refractive errors such as nearsightedness, farsightedness and astigmatism.

But vision is more complicated than simply reading the 20/20 line.

In some patients, irregularities in the cornea following refractive surgery can contribute to higher-order aberrations (HOAs). These complex optical distortions may produce symptoms such as glare, halos, starbursts, ghosting, double vision, reduced contrast and poor night vision after LASIK.

This helps explain why someone may be told that their LASIK surgery was technically successful yet still say:

“I can read the eye chart, but my vision just doesn’t look right.”

For these patients, conventional glasses or ordinary contact lenses may not adequately address the problem.

Dry eye after LASIK is another important concern and one of the most common problems we see in patients following laser eye surgery.

LASIK alters the cornea and affects corneal nerves involved in normal sensation and tear-film regulation. For many patients, dryness improves during the healing process. For others, symptoms can persist.

Post-LASIK dry eye symptoms may include:

• Burning or stinging
• Grittiness or foreign-body sensation
• Redness
• Fluctuating or blurry vision
• Sensitivity to light
• Excessive tearing
• Contact lens intolerance
• Eyes that become increasingly uncomfortable as the day progresses

The FDA notes that LASIK can aggravate existing dry eye and that some patients can develop significant dry eye symptoms following surgery.

Persistent symptoms deserve a comprehensive post-LASIK dry eye evaluation rather than simply assuming the answer is to continue using more artificial tears.

One of the most frustrating things we hear from post-LASIK patients is that they were expecting their symptoms to disappear with time.

Sometimes they do.

Sometimes they don’t.

When glare, halos, starbursts, ghosting, dry eye or poor night vision persist, the first step is determining why.

At Global Complex Eye Care in Baltimore, our advanced diagnostic testing can evaluate the cornea, tear film and ocular surface and help determine whether corneal irregularity, higher-order aberrations, dry eye disease, corneal ectasia or another condition may be contributing to the patient’s symptoms.

Depending on the cause, treatment can be very different from one patient to another.

For patients with significant optical distortion following LASIK, specialized contact lens technology may sometimes provide a level of visual correction that conventional glasses or soft contact lenses cannot.

One important option is an advanced scleral lens for post-LASIK complications.

Unlike a standard contact lens that rests directly on the cornea, a scleral lens vaults over the corneal surface and rests on the white portion of the eye. The fluid reservoir beneath the lens can help create a smoother optical surface while also protecting and hydrating the cornea.

For certain patients with irregular corneas or higher-order aberrations following LASIK, we may consider advanced technologies including:

• Custom wavefront scleral lenses
• Higher-order aberration (HOA) correcting scleral lenses
• Scan-based scleral lenses
• Impression-based scleral lenses
• BostonSight PROSE

These technologies can be particularly valuable when the problem isn’t simply blurry vision, but poor quality of vision after LASIK caused by an irregular optical system.

When dry eye is the primary problem, treatment should be based on the underlying cause.

A comprehensive dry eye evaluation may look for conditions such as meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD), inflammation, tear-film instability, blepharitis, Demodex and other ocular-surface problems.

Depending on the findings, treatment may include medical dry-eye therapy, treatment of the eyelids and meibomian glands, punctal occlusion, advanced in-office dry-eye treatments or specialty scleral lenses.

The goal is not simply to temporarily lubricate the eye. It is to determine what’s causing the patient’s chronic dry eye after LASIK and develop an individualized treatment plan.

Taylor Swift’s LASIK experience appears to be a great example of what patients hope for from LASIK: excellent vision and freedom from glasses or contact lenses.

LASIK has produced excellent results for millions of patients.

But the renewed discussion surrounding Taylor Swift and LASIK eye surgery is also an opportunity to talk about patients whose experiences aren’t quite as straightforward.

According to FDA research, more than 95% of participants in its LASIK quality-of-life studies were satisfied with their vision following surgery. At the same time, some patients who had no visual symptoms before LASIK reported new symptoms such as halos, glare, starbursts or ghosting afterward.

Both things can be true:

LASIK can be a very successful procedure, while some patients can experience significant post-LASIK side effects or complications that deserve specialized care.

Taylor Swift has publicly described her own vision after LASIK as excellent. We are not suggesting that she has experienced LASIK complications. Rather, her recent comments and the renewed media attention surrounding her LASIK procedure provide an opportunity to educate patients about both successful LASIK outcomes and the problems that some patients experience afterward.

If you had LASIK months or years ago and continue to experience dry eyes, glare, halos, starbursts, ghosting, double vision, fluctuating vision, blurry vision or difficulty driving at night, you don’t necessarily have to accept those symptoms as your “new normal.”

At Global Complex Eye Care in Baltimore, Maryland, we evaluate patients with complex post-LASIK vision and ocular-surface problems, including patients who have struggled to find answers elsewhere.

Our advanced diagnostic technology includes Pentacam 3D corneal mapping, OCT imaging, wavefront aberrometry and higher-order aberration testing. These technologies allow us to look beyond a standard eye examination and determine whether corneal irregularity, higher-order aberrations, dry eye disease or another condition may be contributing to your symptoms.

Having 20/20 eyesight doesn’t always mean having 20/20 quality of vision.

If something hasn’t felt right since LASIK, a more specialized evaluation may help determine why.

Disclaimer: Taylor Swift is not a patient of Global Complex Eye Care, and we have no knowledge of her medical care beyond information she has publicly shared. Her experience is referenced solely for educational discussion about LASIK and potential post-LASIK symptoms. Individual results and treatment options vary.