Long-term monitoring of the incision performance of an ophthalmic laser surgical system

A method for monitoring incision performance, comprising:

• instructing, by a computer, a laser device to deliver a laser beam with a laser setting energy towards a target, the laser beam creating a plurality of optical breakdowns in the target to yield a test pattern, the test pattern comprising a plurality of regions of optical breakdowns, each region created with a different laser setting energy;
• generating, by a camera, a plurality of images of the optical breakdowns in the target;
• identifying, by the computer, from the images a lowest energy region with substantially continuous optical breakdowns;
• and
• designating, by the computer, the laser setting energy used to create the identified region as a threshold energy.

An ophthalmic surgical system for monitoring incision performance, comprising:

• a laser device configured to deliver a laser beam with a laser setting energy towards a target, the laser beam creating a plurality of optical breakdowns in the target;
• a camera configured to generate a plurality of images of the optical breakdowns in the target;
• and
• a computer configured to:
• instruct the laser device to create the optical breakdowns in the target to yield a test pattern, the test pattern comprising a plurality of regions of optical breakdowns, each region created with a different laser setting energy, each region of the test pattern having a substantially rectangular shape or a substantially triangular shape;
• identify from the images a lowest energy region with substantially continuous optical breakdowns, the substantially continuous optical breakdowns defined as at least 90% of the pulses formed an optical breakdown;
• designate the laser setting energy used to create the identified region as a threshold energy;
• access a previous test pattern comprising a plurality of previous regions of previous optical breakdowns, the previous test pattern created more than one month ago, the regions of the test pattern arranged substantially similarly to the previous regions of the previous test pattern such that each region has a corresponding previous region in the same location, for each region, the laser setting energy that created the region is substantially the same as the laser setting energy that created the previous region corresponding to the region;
• compare the test pattern with the previous test pattern to detect a change in threshold energy;
• provide a notification of the change in the threshold energy;
• adjust the laser setting energy to compensate for the change in the threshold energy;
• and
• extrapolate from the test pattern and the previous test pattern to predict a future threshold energy.