Answer: Laser and visual limits in JAR.
 

Got a letter from JAA today. Thought that I would share it with you. I put up some questions about why there is a eye limit and tell me some more about the laser regulations.

Dear Mr. Enggaard,

Thank you for your e-mail enquiring about acceptance of laser surgery for a
Class 1 medical certificate.

Please note that - though I will try to explain the JAR-FCL 3 requirements
- any decision about fitness/unfitness of an applicant for a medical
certificate or for a licence is up to the National Authority, in your case
the CAA Denmark.

In JAR-FCL 3 limits of refractive errors are set because some complications
leading to a sudden deterioration of vision, e.g. retinal bleeding, are
more frequent with higher refractive errors. Until a very short time ago
those limits were even more stringent and with the new and more liberal
limits we expect to gain experience for an eventual further relaxation in
the far future.

Laser surgery is only accepted if the result is according to the
requirements and pre-surgery refractive error was less than +/- 5 dioptres.
The reason for this is that we do not want to exclude initial applicants
who had laser surgery before they considered to be a pilot but we do not
want to have laser surgery performed in order to get a medical certificate.
Though the operation is usually performed without complications there is
the remote chance that vision after surgery is worse than it was before the
procedure. In addition to that, laser surgery does not change the rate of
complications due to the refractive error itself and that is why the limits
for refractive errors have been set in the first place.

If you choose to get a FAA licence instead of a JAR-Licence because of your
refractive error I would like to draw your attention to the fact that
conversion of that licence may be difficult. Please get advice from you
National Authority before you start training for a FAA licence.

END

Now I know that and I hope it can answers some of you guys questions.