A cataract is when the natural lens inside the eye becomes cloudy. It is not a growth over the eye. The only way to improve vision is with surgery to remove the cataract and replace it with a clear artificial lens. Without cataract surgery, the vision slowly worsens as the lens hardens, until the eye becomes blind. In Australia we intervene before patients experience severe vision loss. The operation takes around 5-10 minutes, and is done with local anaesthetic and light sedation as day-only surgery. You will be awake, but you will have light sedation to calm the nerves, which may block your memory of the operation. A cataract typically develops slowly and can affect one or both eyes. Cataract usually occurs from the age of 60 upwards, although it can occur in younger adults and rarely even in children and babies. Most cataracts are a result of the natural ageing of the eye. From age 40 onwards, metabolic changes start occurring in the crystalline lens that cause it to take on water and become less flexible. The first signs of this are difficulty focusing on near objects – called presbyopia. Presbyopia occurs in everyone after a certain age and is corrected with glasses. Eventually, these lens changes progress to the point where cloudy opacities develop in the lens which at first can cause difficulty with glare and driving at night, but eventually cause blurring and alteration of colour perception. This can only be improved through surgery.