South Piedmont Community College health science program

A cataract is a clouding of the eye's lens that causes decreased vision. A cataract develops when some proteins clump together and starts to cloud an area of the lens. A cataract won't spread from one eye to the other, although many people develop cataracts in both eyes. As the cataract matures and gets cloudier, it may become difficult to read and do other normal tasks. A number of factors are known to contribute to the formation of cataracts, including aging, certain eye infections, and excessive exposure to bright sunlight.

Cataract surgery is usually done under local anesthesia, and most often takes less than one hour to remove the cloudy lens and replace it with an artificial one. There are two primary types of cataract-removal surgery. The first is Small Incision Cataract Surgery, where a tiny probe is inserted into the eye. The probe emits ultrasound waves that break up the cloudy lens into small fragments able to be removed by suction. The second type of cataract surgery is called is Extra-capsular Surgery, where an incision is made in the eye, and the hard center of the lens is removed.