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Complaints of glare, halos, and disturbances of night vision after photorefractive keratectomy (PRK) probably result from changes in the corneal aberration structure induced by the laser ablation procedure. The purpose of this article is to characterize changes in the corneal aberration structure after PRK and to demonstrate the effect of pupil dilation on these changes.

Videokeratographs obtained preoperatively (n=112) and at 1 (n=94), 3 (n=103), 6 (n=91), 12 (n=60), 18 (n=53), and 24 (n=44) months postoperatively from 112 eyes of 89 patients who had undergone PRK for myopia were analyzed. The data were used to calculate the wavefront variance of the cornea for both small (3-mm) and large (7-mm) pupils.

For both the 3- and 7-mm pupil, coma-like aberrations increased significantly from preoperative values to 1-month postoperative values (P<.05 andP<.001, respectively); for 7-mm …