a procedureImplantable collamer lens

A soft lens is folded through a small corneal wound and placed behind the iris, in front of the eye's own lens, which stays. No tissue is removed and the operation can in principle be reversed. It is the answer for the eyes laser surgery is refused for — thin corneas, prescriptions too strong to carve — and it costs several times as much per eye.

The pairing is the point. Both operations are sold from the same providers to the same patients, and the price gap is consistent across two countries.

Bumrungrad in Bangkok lists ICL for a single eye at 129,000 baht and the toric version, which also corrects astigmatism, at 161,000 — package IPDEYE42, prices stated valid until 31 December 2026. Two doors down its own list, laser vision correction by ReLEx SMILE for both eyes is 102,000 baht. One eye by lens implant costs a quarter as much again as two eyes by laser.

Optegra in the United Kingdom prices EVO ICL at £3,595 per eye against LASIK at £2,095 and LASEK at £1,495 on its own laser page — the implant at one and a half to two and a half times the laser.

The hospital page is unusually clear about who it is for. Bumrungrad's list of candidates names people with thin corneas and people whose myopia, presbyopia or astigmatism "cannot be corrected by laser treatment", along with a requirement for sufficiently deep eye chambers and no history of uveitis, glaucoma or diabetic retinopathy.

The package terms are as clear about the money: the price covers surgeon, hospital and nursing fees for the surgery only and "Medical device, such as, ICL (only the types specified in the package)"; it excludes physician's fees, consultations and pre-surgical screening, medication and any other tests; and it covers out-patient same-day surgery only, with overnight stays charged extra.

Inference — the lens is inside this package and the appointment that decides whether the eye can take one is outside it. That is the same shape as the cataract package from the same hospital, and it means the sum a traveller can plan with is the package plus an examination they cannot have until they arrive.

A suitability examination measuring the depth of the anterior chamber and the health of the cornea, sometimes a preliminary laser iridotomy to let fluid pass, then drops, a three-millimetre wound, the folded lens injected and positioned behind the iris. Minutes per eye, no stitches, no removal of tissue. Pressure in the eye is checked within hours because the new lens can obstruct flow.

The lens stays for decades and can be exchanged or taken out; where the natural lens later clouds, the ICL is removed at the cataract operation. That is the sentence on which the whole comparison with laser surgery turns, and no price page read for this record prices the removal.

As of 17 September 2026 the published prices read for this record are 129,000 baht for one eye in Bangkok, 161,000 for the toric version, and £3,595 per eye in the United Kingdom. No third country's published ICL price could be read off a provider's own page for this record.

This page describes an elective eye operation and the prices published for it. It is not medical advice and it does not say who is a candidate.