Positive Experiences
Overwhelmingly positive patient reviews
This facility does more than just LASIK; they also do Cataract Surgery. I've seen suggestions (unfortunately I don't remember where I saw them) that surgeons who are proficient in more types of surgery are more well rounded and more willing to recommend alternatives to LASIK, which may be desirable if you aren't a good candidate for LASIK. For example, some reviews of this facility mention LASEK and another mentions a toric lens. This facility has 4.9 stars, which is very high for a facility with so few reviews.
Google Reviews
5 star experience all around - from scheduling to the waiting room, to the gals assisting to Dr. Carlson. Been going here for over 10 years and it’s always a great experience. Dr. Carlson is THE best in the cities!
So happy I landed with Dr Carlson 7 years ago. He put in new lenses and took care of my cataracts. 20/20 vision now. Their office is very friendly and efficient and I'm happy to be a patient with Claris Eye.
Great Doctor. Is very knowledgeable and is an expert surgeon. Definitely recommend entrusting your eye care to Dr. Carlson.
I would highly recommend Claris. I’m just a few hours post Lasek but had a great experience. The doctor was very calming through the procedure. Prior to committing to lasek, they did an initial exam to clear me to get it and then another exam the week before the surgery to triple check my eyes were healthy enough. That’s not something that was offered with other LASIK centers. They don’t treat you like just another patient, number or dollar sign. They really care you get the best results and answer all questions vs shoving you through the door. I like that there’s a direct line to contact instead of going through a call center. The pricing is more than far and there’s no hidden fees or changes to the cost. Update October 2025: I couldn’t continue to recommend Claris enough. I am about 6 months post Lasek and my eyes are 20/15. I have very very minor dry eye but otherwise no complaints. The first month-2 months I got a little discouraged as my eyes were a bit blurry and had astigmatism but they have healed greatly over the last 6 months. I was 20/20 in mid June 2025 and now 20/15 in October. The first few days post surgery there is a lot of pain but once you make it through the first 3 days, you are good. I needed a driver the first few days but Claris was up front about that. Other LASIK centers didn’t seem to offer as much follow up as Claris has. I have had multiple follow up appointments as they want to make sure your eyes are healing properly and provide recommendations if needed. Dr. Carlson treats you like family as he remember to ask about some of my life events. Other lasik centers seemed to only offer 1 initial appointment before clearing you for surgery, but Dr. Carlson goes above the standard and does 2 appointments before the surgery to triple check your eyes are healthy for surgery.
Great experience with Dr. Carlson and his staff. The eye surgery was a success and appreciate the follow up.Thanks for the care.
Incidents
There aren't enough incident reviews to rate this facility's handling of failed surgeries. This is common for surgery centers which offer more than just LASIK procedures.
TreatScore Methodology
TreatScore tries to objectively rate providers using publicly available data. TreatCost's commentary should not affect TreatScore.
Positive Experience Weight: 85%
In a study finished in 2011, 95% of patients were satisfied their LASIK eye surgery. We want to reflect this in our scoring.
New technology like Contoura / Wavefront, ICL, and other types of vision correction surgery may result in even higher positive outcome rates. Given this and the large number of online reviews of LASIK available, we feel star ratings and comments from consumer review sites like Google Maps are the best representation of LASIK quality when surgery is successful. For centers which only perform LASIK and related surgeries, we use every rating in the score. For locations which perform more types of ophthalmic surgery and other types of vision appointments, we consider both their overall rating (50%) and the rating for patients who mention LASIK, PRK, or a related surgery in their review (50%).
Incident Management Weight: 15%
Although only a small fraction of patients have negative outcomes from LASIK, the disproportionate effects from a failed surgery mean we give them a disproportionately higher weight.
Our goal is to convey how well (or poorly) your case would be handled if your surgery failed. To that end, our Incident ratings are calculated from 3 equally weighed elements:
- Incident acknowledgement: Whether the provider acknowledges incidents
- Second surgery offer: Whether the provider tries to fix failed surgeries for patients at no cost to the patient
- 3rd party offer: Whether the provider refers patients to a 3rd party for a surgical or other fix at no cost to the patient
Why do we use these criteria?
- Incident acknowledgement: To receive remediative care patients must know such care is available. If a provider acknowledges an incident early, that can help patients
- Second surgery offer: We have reviewed hundreds of LASIK reviews, and in many cases providers offer to fix failed surgeries with a subsequent surgery. Because many providers offer this service, we assume it is effective and we include it in our Incident Management review. If the provider refers all patients to a 3rd party at no cost to the patient then they get a perfect score
- 3rd party offer: In reviewing dozens of patient incident stories, we found many patients refused to allow their original surgeon to operate on them again for fear of a second failure. For these patients, we know they often seek a 3rd party service to help them, and in TreatCost's opinion the original provider should pay for that service
These criteria are not comprehensive. TreatScore includes multiple data sources, but we do not always include every piece of information in our score. TreatScore is intended to be a starting point to help patients understand the experiences of other patients, so all calculations are based on patient reviews and patient incident reports. If you are a provider and want to improve your score, we recommend asking patients who experience an incident to post their experience online and then send TreatCost.com a link to this content via our Feedback Form.
Disclaimers and Warnings
I am not a doctor. MN law prohibits referral payments. Gregory Ledray owns & operates treatcost.com.
This review is not medical advice and was not created by a physician. Each patient is unique, so any descriptions or statistics of medical care, devices, or other information can not predict an individual patient's experience. Patients seeking advice on their unique health situation should seek the advice of a physician.