WaveTec Prepares for a New Wave in Refractive Surgery

Article preview reprinted from Start-Up - September 2008

Refractive lens exchange is a mega opportunity in ophthalmology with the potential to serve the large patient populations with presbyopia and astigmatism. The category has been slow to take off, however, because current technology doesn't allow clinicians to meet, consistently and with confidence, the high expectations of new refractive surgery customers who are paying out of pocket for the benefit of great vision, at all distances. WaveTec has an enabling technology for a wide range of refractive surgeries to help clinicians and the many manufacturers of implantable intraocular lenses deliver on the promise of better vision.

Article preview reprinted from Start-Up - September 2008

WaveTec Prepares for a New Wave in Refractive Surgery

Refractive lens exchange—a mega-opportunity in ophthalmology—hasn't yet taken off as everyone thought it would. WaveTec has an enabling technology that could help.

• Millions of baby boomers now realize that LASIK isn't a solution for all vision problems; presbyopia has set in, complicated by astigmatism, and they're searching for new surgical options.
• The ophthalmic industry is looking to intraocular lenses to solve a range of refractive problems that affect enormous populations, under a self-pay scenario.
• Refractive lens exchange has been slow to take off because current technology doesn't allow clinicians to meet, consistently and with confidence, the high expectations of the new refractive surgery customers.
• WaveTec has an enabling technology for a wide range of refractive surgeries to help clinicians deliver on the promise of better vision.

Ever since the baby boomers have been old enough to make purchasing decisions, they've been driving growth—and advances—in vision correction surgery, also known as refractive surgery. An active, affluent population focused on quality of life and accustomed to paying out of pocket for new technologies that make their lives easier—not just cell phones, laptop computers, and iPods, but also elective medical procedures—has helped to create a $2.5 billion per year industry in LASIK (laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis). According to Market Scope, an ophthalmic industry research consultancy, in the US, 1.3 million people each year go under the laser for the benefits of spectacle-free vision correction. In 2007, pricing for LASIK surgery in the US averaged $2,099 per eye (without add-on charges for more advanced technology).

But the LASIK market has hit a wall; revenues are on a downward trend for several reasons. A slowdown is occurring because of cuts in discretionary spending in a troubled economy and in reaction to negative publicity about post-LASIK complications, highlighted by an FDA ophthalmic devices panel in April 2008. (See "ASCRS: A Look Ahead in Eye Surgery," Medtech Insight, May 2008 [2008400037].) There is one other factor: as yesterday's LASIK patients age, it's becoming clearer to the general public that LASIK isn't a permanent solution.

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Companies mentioned in this article:

AcuFocus Inc.
Acuity Medical Inc.
Advanced Medical Optics Inc.
Bausch & Lomb Inc.
CR Bard Inc.
Carl Zeiss AG
Carl Zeiss Meditech AG
Carl Zeiss Meditec Inc.
HumanOptics AG
Lenstec Inc.
Nestle SA
Alcon Inc.
NuLens Ltd.
PowerVision Inc.
Refocus Group Inc.
Staar Surgical Co.
Tekia Inc.
Visiogen Inc.
WaveTec Vision

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