How LASIK Surgery Works

A camera has a lens -- a curved piece of glass that helps define and focus the image in front of it. Your eye has a lens, too -- a membrane called the cornea, which curves over the top of the eye and helps you focus. If that membrane is perfectly formed, then you have 20/20 vision. For most people, though, the cornea is slightly misshapen in one direction or another, delivering images that are blurred or making it harder to focus. In LASIK surgery, a specialized laser is used to make precise corrections to the shape of the cornea.