LASER PROPERTIES AND EYE HAZARDS

Eye injury is a recognized hazard of laser radiation. This report includes a basic discussion of those laser output parameters that are important in understanding lasers and how they are related to laser eye injury. The three most significant properties of laser beams in this respect are wavelength, time characteristics and beam geometry. The first two determine the site most susceptible to injury and its sensitivity to laser exposure dose. The third, beam geometry, essentially governs the distance at which a given laser is capable of producing a hazardous exposure condition. A brief description of experimental injury findings and some threshold exposure doses, as reported in the literature, are summarized. Laser safety considerations are discussed.