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You are old enough to qualify. The question is whether your prescription has stopped moving — because that, not your age, decides whether a correction will hold.
The FDA approves LASIK from 18, but almost no good surgeon operates on age alone. What matters is whether your prescription has stopped changing. Dr. Lee wants to see a correction that has not moved meaningfully for at least 12 months.
If it has settled, this band has the healthiest corneas of any age group and every corneal option is open: LASIK, SMILE, EVO ICL and PRK. If it has not, waiting a year is not a rejection — it is what makes the result last.
Correcting a moving target does not work. Eyes commonly continue changing through the late teens and into the early twenties, and a correction calculated on a prescription that is still drifting will be wrong within a few years.
This is the single most common reason a healthy 19-year-old is asked to come back. It has nothing to do with risk tolerance and everything to do with arithmetic: the measurement has to be final before it can be built into your cornea permanently.
Bring your last two or three prescriptions if you have them — the comparison over time tells us more than any single measurement. At the consultation we run corneal topography, pachymetry, refraction and a dry eye assessment, then compare against your history.
If your prescription has held steady, you are a candidate now. If it has moved more than about a quarter dioptre in the last year, we will ask you to return once it settles.
| Procedure | Best for | Price (both eyes) |
|---|---|---|
| LASIK | Most prescriptions; recovery in hours | $4,000 all-inclusive |
| SMILE | Myopia with dry-eye tendency; flap-free | $4,000 all-inclusive |
| EVO ICL | High prescriptions or thin corneas; removable | from $6,000 |
| PRK | Contact sports, military, law enforcement | $5,000 all-inclusive |
If you box, wrestle, do martial arts, or are heading for military or law-enforcement service, say so at the consultation. LASIK creates a corneal flap, and although displacing one is rare, PRK creates no flap at all — nothing that can ever be dislodged by an impact. Slower recovery, permanently fewer worries.
Several branches of the US military specify PRK for this reason. At your age it is worth deciding with the next ten years in mind, not just the next ten days.
The same as at any age — $4,000 both eyes all-inclusive for LASIK or SMILE, with 0% financing available at $66.67 a month over 60 months. There is no student rate and no youth discount, but there is also no upsell: the price covers the evaluation, the procedure, all medications, every follow-up visit and any future enhancement.
Worth doing the arithmetic: at 20, a lifetime of contact lenses ahead of you costs several times more than the procedure. Our cost calculator puts real numbers on it.
Age is a starting point, not a rule. Two people the same age can need different procedures, because what matters is the cornea and the natural lens — not the birthday.
Legally yes. The FDA approves LASIK from 18. In practice most surgeons, including Dr. Lee, prefer the low-to-mid 20s, because prescriptions commonly continue changing through the late teens. The requirement at CCRS is at least 12 months of prescription stability, regardless of your age.
18 is the FDA-approved minimum for laser vision correction in the United States. Below that, LASIK is only performed in rare medical circumstances rather than for routine vision correction. Age alone does not make someone a candidate, though. A stable prescription does.
Compare your last two or three glasses or contact lens prescriptions. If the correction has changed by less than about a quarter dioptre over 12 months, it is considered stable. Bring those records to your consultation, because the comparison over time tells us more than any single measurement.
Often yes, and it is not a rejection. Being asked to wait a year is the difference between a correction that holds for decades and one that drifts within a few years. If your prescription has genuinely settled, there is no benefit to waiting further, and your corneas will not be healthier later than they are now.
For contact sports and several military roles, yes. LASIK creates a corneal flap, and although displacement is rare, PRK creates no flap at all, so there is nothing that can be dislodged by an impact. Recovery takes longer with PRK, three to five days of blurry vision rather than hours, but it removes that concern permanently.
Medically reviewed by Paul C. Lee, MD, board-certified ophthalmologist (American Board of Ophthalmology), cornea & refractive fellowship, Tulane University · last reviewed August 2026.
Your free consultation measures corneal thickness, prescription and tear film. If your eyes are still changing, Dr. Lee will tell you to wait — and exactly what to come back for.
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