Partial retinal detachment surgery questions.

[Joco34]

I have a partial retinal detachment that i am being operated on for in a week. They dont know which method they will use until they are in. Had pre-op assessment today but wasn't told about how long I couldn't drive or wouldn't be able to see for and after so many health questions I forgot to ask!
Any ideas please?

Sorry to hear this. I haven’t had this done myself but I’ve read a lot about it as I have other retinal issues and I’m extremely high risk. I think Moorfields have a very good leaflet about it; worth a google. As far as I know it’s about 6 weeks recovery but it does depend on what kind of surgery you have - whether it’s the buckle type or gas bubble. The early stages are the most important in terms of posturing (often lying on your side or face down for most of the day) so the retina heals well.

In terms of driving, it depends how well adapted you are. I've had periods of blindness in one eye and mostly kept driving but I'm used to my vision coming and going on that side and learnt to drive like that. So I would imagine once you've completed any posturing you'd be pretty much good to drive assuming the vision in your other eye is good. But obviously don't drive until cleared to be the doc, or your insurance will be invalid.

Edited to add, just realised if they put a gas bubble in, it stops you seeing properly for around 6 weeks. So that would change things.

Hi, I had cryotherapy (freezing) to fix my detached retina. I spent the majority of the time lay down whilst waiting for surgery, so much so that it partially reattached itself. The consultant was quite amazed! But it still definitely wasn't right so I had the cryotherapy followed by some further laser correction a week or so afterwards, which was painless. For the surgery, I had a general anaesthetic and discovered I had stitches in my eye afterwards, which was weird. They dissolved by themselves though.

Again, recovery involved a lot of lying down, my partner at the time had to do literally everything and I watched endless TV programmes from my bed 😂 Mine healed well so my advice would be to stay as horizontal as possible! Good luck with the surgery, it was quite quick for me, in and out same day. I do have an area of floaters (like lots of tiny dots) that have never gone away since the surgery but they aren't noticeable most of the time. Hope it all goes well for you!