I thought laser surgery was as simple as having a spray tan
The singer tells Lucy Benyon how the eye procedure left him with permanent problems
When 1980s pop supremo Limahl noticed his near vision deteriorating, he didn’t think twice about booking himself in for corrective laser treatment.
But it’s a decision he now bitterly regrets – because the surgery not only almost destroyed his vision, it has permanently damaged his eyes.
A decade on, the former Kajagoogoo frontman suffers from such chronically dry eyes that he needs to apply eyedrops countless times a day, dreads flying and must avoid air conditioning and central heating.
“It might sound like a minor problem, but it can be very limiting and uncomfortable,” says Limahl, 61, who recently started acting as well as singing, having found international fame 40 years ago with charttopping hits such as Too Shy and The Never Ending Story.
“I guess I’m lucky that all my eye problems haven’t affected my career,” adds the star, who has just released his latest single, Still In Love.
“But I have to wear special eye gels to sleep in, and every morning I need to clean the inside of my eyelids. My eyes are constantly irritating me too.”
The irony is that before surgery, the singer had always had good eyesight and had only been wearing glasses for four years.
“I have never been short-sighted, but in my mid-forties, I started to struggle a bit with my near vision,” says Limahl, who lives with his partner Steve in Hertfordshire. “It got really annoying having to rummage around for reading glasses every time I wanted to look at a menu or read the paper, but I’d never really considered surgery.”
Then in 2010, he recalls how he was sitting in a green room, waiting to appear on a chat show when presenter Anne Diamond started talking about a friend of hers who’d had LASIK laser surgery and was delighted with the results. Without giving it too much thought, Limahl got the number of the clinic and booked himself in for an appointment to have the same surgery.
The procedure cost him £4,000 an eye, and he admits that he never considered that anything could go wrong.
According to the Royal College of Ophthalmologists (RCO) more than 100,000 patients a year undergo LASIK laser surgery in the UK. It involves cutting a flap on the surface of the cornea so that lasers can be used to alter its shape to correct short-sightedness. The procedure typically takes 15 minutes per eye and has a 95% success rate with many patients describing it as life changing.
At first, Limahl assumed the surgery had been a success, but over the next few days, his sight became increasingly blurred, and alarm bells began to ring. “I really couldn’t see properly at all,” he recalls. “My balance and spatial awareness were all over the place.”
Alarmed, Limahl returned to the surgery where he learned that his poor vision was the result of an “overcorrection”. He was told he would have to wait another three months before he could have more laser surgery to correct the error. Surprisingly, the latest research from the RCO, says that one in 10 patients need to have their initial refraction altered.
“It was really terrifying,” says Limahl, who didn’t know whether he would ever see properly again.
Fortunately, the second procedure did restore his vision, but it left him with permanently dry eyes.
“In the terms and conditions I had to sign before the operation, it did state that 20% of patients were left with dry eyes – but I never thought I’d be one of them,” he says.
When the dryness became uncomfortable, he sought advice from an eye specialist at the Royal Free Hospital in London who told him that the second laser operation had permanently damaged the Meibomian glands in his eyes which secrete oils to prevent tears from evaporating too quickly and drying out the eyes.
“I was gutted when I discovered I’d be reliant on eye drops and gels for the rest of my life, but I’ve come to think of myself as one of the lucky ones,” he says.
Limahl is referring to the fact that despite its high success rate, not everyone gets a happy ending after laser surgery with some patients being left with light sensitivity, stabbing pains and blurred vision.
Indeed, in 2018 an American TV presenter Jessica Starr took her own life after being left with intense pain and poor vision after having laser surgery in the USA.
“It’s just not the miracle treatment it’s portrayed to be,” concludes Limahl. “I thought getting my eyes done would be as simple as having a spray tan. But your eyes are incredibly delicate – I just wish I’d never put mine under the knife.”
I have to use eye gels and each morning I clean the insides of my eyelids