Lasik eye surgery, marketed as a simple procedure with complication rates under one percent, is now linked to an alarming number of suicides.
Lasik eye surgery, or laser vision correction marketed as simple and with a one percent is called “the biggest scam ever put on the American public…” by Edward Boshnick, a Miami-based eye doctor.
After a 26-year-old officer took his life citing complications from the surgery other cases linked to the procedure have surfaced. Officer Ryan Kingerski with Penn Hills Police Department had suffered from excruciating pain, double vision and persistent headaches.
“I can’t take this anymore. Lasik took everything from me,” he wrote in his suicide note.
Former head of FDA branch reviewing Lasik procedures petitioned to revoke approval
The former head of the FDA branch responsible for reviewing data and approving Lasik operations, Morris Waxler, petitioned to revoke the administrations approval of the procedure.
The decision came after his own analysis revealed a bleak reality: the complication rates sat between 10 to 30 percent, rather than the less than one percent marketed to consumers.
“It didn’t matter what questions and concerns I had, because the surgeons were very powerful and still are,” Waxler told The Post.
Devastating complications of Lasik chronicled across a number of suicide notes
In 2018, Detroit TV meteorologist Jessica Starr died by suicide at the age of 35 after suffering complications following Lasik surgery.
According to her family, Starr struggled with severe pain and worsening vision problems after the procedure. Before her death, she documented her emotional and physical struggles in video diary entries and reportedly sought help from both eye specialists and therapists.
“Prior to the procedure, Jessica was completely normal, very healthy,” her husband Dan Rose told The Post. “There was no depression… no underlying issue.”
Another case involved Canadian father-of-two Paul Fitzpatrick, who blamed decades of post-Lasik pain in his suicide note before taking his own life in 2018.
Fitzpatrick described years of burning sensations in his eyes, headaches and constant pain that left him barely able to function.
“Pain, pain and more pain,” he wrote in the note.
Paula Cofer, who runs a Lasik complications support group online, told The Post she personally knows at least 40 people who have died by suicide following severe complications from the surgery.
“Not everyone has severe complications but a lot more people are suffering than you know,” she said.
More than 10 million Americans have undergone Lasik surgery since the procedure was approved by the FDA in 1999. According to the FDA, possible risks include vision loss, glare, halos, double vision and other debilitating visual symptoms.
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