The Eyes have it: Cataract Surgery and Changing Patterns of Outpatient Surgery

Abstract

Health care utilization by the elderly has increased during recent times. However, a number of investigators have indicated that this increase has had less to do with increasing numbers of elders than with increasing age-specific utilization rates for a variety of health services. 1985 and 1993 health data for British Columbia were used to examine changes in outpatient surgical utilization among the general population and changes in cataract surgical utilization among the elderly. Utilization increases in the older persons exceeded what would be expected on the basis of population increase. Furthermore, cataract surgery alone accounted for more than 29 percent of the entire utilization increase observed for outpatient surgery. Despite this increase, the average age at cataract surgery has not changed—seniors of all ages are much more likely to receive cataract surgery now than a decade ago. The authors' findings suggest that a part of this observed increase is due to operating on individuals at preoperative levels of better visual function.