Gregg Homer, California Doctor, Claims He Can Permanently Turn Brown Eyes Blue

Thanks to a new medical procedure, having the blues will be a whole lot easier for people with brown eyes.

A doctor in Southern California says he has pioneered a new treatment that can permanently turn brown eyes into blue eyes without impacting a patient's vision.

It took Dr. Gregg Homer and his firm, Stroma Medical, a decade to figure out how to remove the brown pigment called melanin from irises, revealing blue pigment beneath. The process they discovered takes just 20 seconds to complete.

"We use a laser, and it's tuned to a specific frequency to remove the pigment from the surface of the iris," Homer told KTLA.

Patients watch a short animated sequence while a computer-guided laser does the work, The New York Daily News reports.

"You won’t feel anything," the Laguna Beach doctor told the paper. "Your eyes will get a little darker for the first week. Then in two to four weeks, they'll be completely changed."

After completing the treatment, which is expected to cost about $5,000, the brown pigment won't return, Homer claims.

He is confident the procedure doesn't cause tissue damage, though he expects his company will spend another year conducting research on the treatment. It could be available in the United States in three years, KTLA reports.

If Homer is right, he won't be hurting for patients.

In a poll of 2,000 patients, 17.5 percent said they would seek the treatment, he told The Daily News.

WATCH KTLA'S REPORT:

Comments

[Please Help]

11:50 PM on 12/22/2011

There are many people out there with eye injuries and color differences/malformations that could find some peace with this procedure. Before you say that they should embrace their differences, and love themselves for their uniqueness, maybe you should walk in their shoes for maybe a decade or so before you speak to what is best for them. Please do not deny these people the opportunity to make a decision best for them. Thank you.

[aliali1]

06:47 AM on 11/20/2011

whats email or tel dr gregg homer?

[aliali1]

06:46 AM on 11/20/2011

how can i contact with dr gregg homer?

[Philloboda]

08:23 PM on 11/14/2011

Well I have mixed feelings. My eyes are light blue but when I got in a welding accident the light gave my right eye 2 brown spots. I was devastated. This new procedure may be able to help me get it back.

[Pen05]

04:52 PM on 11/30/2011

Im in the same boat, I have green eyes but got brown spots because of an eyelash growth serum :(. Biggest mistake ever. If he could get rid of the brown spots I would be interested.

[ALEX AK47]

01:08 AM on 11/11/2011

Please help me! how can i get doctor's email?

[Jawahn Thompson]

11:30 PM on 11/08/2011

hmm, didn't the Nazis try an excruciating experiment like this during the world war, among other human tests and experiments?!

[XYofLight Sylph]

12:17 PM on 11/08/2011

Whatever. Those of us with beautiful eyes are not impressed as you'll never pass your newly acquired "trait" to your offspring.

[Wendy Stewart]

11:16 AM on 11/08/2011

Ridiculous. Try finding a cure for blindness then you will have my applaud.

[Katie Pierce2]

05:02 AM on 11/28/2011

Nope. No one is trying to "have your applaud" sorry.

[Mon Key]

12:05 AM on 11/08/2011

Amazing! Now if they can work on permanently changing blind eyes to seeing eyes that would be awesome...

[Jenn2]

09:58 PM on 11/07/2011

Yes I wanna look like a scary vamp, sign me up immediately.

[elizabethwhite]

08:36 PM on 11/07/2011

I think it just boils down to each individual's free choice made in the balance of health risk and preference. As long as there will be a regulation to ban parents from imposing this operation on their children, and as long as they will not advertise it to rake in profits by damaging vulnerable youth's self esteem, I am neutral about the technology itself and the choice other informed adults may make.

Personally, I would not change myself too much to meet a temporary and local standard of beauty. When you look around the world and at history, women in China had their feet bound to keep it as small as 3 inches. Also, some women in Myanmar had long coils around their necks. And you may remember the scene from "Gone With The Wind" where Scarlett O'Hara asks her attendant to tighten the corset. Though these customs may have had different purposes other than beauty, people there, then, generally regarded that smaller feet, longer-looking necks, or smaller waists were more beautiful. But if you look at the picutre in the linked pages, it is likely you will just be shocked and won't see it as beautiful. Which, I think, says a lot about how changeable our standard for beauty can be. I would not keep up with such arbitrary thing, risking my health, especially when it's about my eye!

(bound feet)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_binding
(coil on necks)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayan

[Marilyn Corpus Nolan]

08:16 PM on 11/07/2011

CONTACTS....hasnt anyone heard of them....it changes eye colors and temporary and u
nexpensive.....Go contacts

[Katie Pierce2]

05:06 AM on 11/28/2011

Contacts. HOW COULD WE NOT HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT CONTACTS!! MY GOD!!

Of course "we" thought about contacts, except ya know it's kinda hard wearing contacts all the time and trying not to get an infection and having your eyes dry out...yeaaa, contacts.
1) Contacts are uncomfortable for the most part
2) Contacts sometimes cause infections
3) Such a pain to clean, take out, put back in again
4) Temporary and not as cheap
5) People keep asking "are those contacts?" because they look fake
6) Very real looking contacts cost around 500 to 700 dollars. Yea, cheap.

Personally, I'm changing my green eyes to the color I want as soon as this procedure becomes allowed.

[Litho-stone]

04:04 PM on 11/07/2011

Big brown eyes are just about the sexiest trait a woman could have.

[Katie Pierce2]

05:07 AM on 11/28/2011

Your opinion. I think big blue eyes are the most beautiful and sexiest trait a man (or woman) can have.

[mamoseley3]

01:52 PM on 11/07/2011

So what's the big deal? I have had brown eyes all my life until about six or seven years ago when I started taking the herb eyebright. Not only did it halt the growth of a teeny tiny cataract that had started in one eye, but it also changed my eye color to hazel (green). My eyes are still hazel.

[mccglf]

01:24 PM on 11/07/2011

Doesn't Crystal Gayle have the copywright on turning "brown eyes blue?"