The History of Modern Cataract Surgery

Book excerpt: Surely the threat of blindness from whatever cause, is an event faced by an ever-growing segment of our aging population. However, when the cause was cataract formation, over the centuries a definite treatment evolved and became available to help those afflicted with this problem, from couching, through crude extra-capsular Graeffe knife extraction, intra-capsular cataract surgery, and planned extra-capsular surgery, to phacoemulsification (ultrasound or laser). Doctors, therefore, recognized very early that there was one blinding condition which could be treated and in which vision could be i.