Ioannis Pallikaris

Who is Ioannis Pallikaris?

Ioannis G. Pallikaris is a Greek ophthalmologist who in 1989 performed the first LASIK procedure on a human eye. Pallikaris also developed Epi-LASIK.

Professor Palikaris was the rector of the University of Crete between 2003 and 2011. He is also the founder and director of the Institute of Vision and Optics in the same university. The institute focuses on providing high-quality specialized health services, such as refractive surgery, photodynamic therapy and the evaluation of vision operation through specialized diagnostic techniques. One of IVO's labs is the Vardinogianion Eye Institute of Crete, which provides health services ranging from primary to specialized tertiary treatment. Financially its activities are administered by the University of Crete's Research Account.

Professor Pallikaris serves as the Medical Advisory Board Chair for Presbia, an ophthalmic device company, where he is responsible for overseeing the post-market surveillance trials of the Flexivue Microlens, a corneal inlay treatment for presbyopia, the age-related loss of near vision. He also conducts training sessions for surgeons at the Vardinoyannion Eye Institute. The Flexivue Microlens is a 3-mm in diameter lens that is inserted into a corneal pocket created by a femtosecond laser in the non-dominant eye of a presbyopic patient. The lens preserves the patient's distance vision, while providing equivalent near vision correction, allowing the patient to focus on near objects without the aid of reading glasses.