Skip to main content

It's truly amazing

I find it truly amazing that it was my primary care physician that had the foresight to send me to the ophthalmologist for evaluation for cataracts, rather than the optometrist I saw for evaluation of my rapidly changing eyesight and prevalence for infections.

It's like I've always said, it's not the health care system that determines your quality of care, but rather the doctors. The only problem being there are good doctors and bad doctors, and it's not always so easy to determine which are which.

Anyways, as a result of the visit to the ophthalmologist I've been approved for cataract surgery. It's just not going to happen as soon as I would hope. (I'm looking at early March.)

Apparently there are few other people seeking cataract surgery as well. (And here I thought I was the only one with such a problem.)

I find it hard to believe that many people are in need of cataract surgery, but I was also told there is a possibility I could get in sooner, as patients have been known to change their mind. It is mostly old people getting the surgery after all.

Oh well, I guess that's one more thing to blame on the Affordable Care Act (AKA ObamaCare).
Labels:

Comments

Alan said…
I don't understand whats "amazing". Why wouldn't your primary care doctor send you to an ophthalmologist for evaluation for cataracts. Optometrists don't treat cataracts?
I do agree there are good doctors and bad doctors and non doctors usually can't tell the difference.
12:53 PM
Marc said…
I know optometrists don't treat cataracts, but I would think they would have more knowledge about problems with the eye than my PCP.

Although based on my latest experience with this optometrist, I have discovered that not to be the case.

This optometrist told me the cataract was worse in my right eye, when in reality it is worse in my left. He also told me it is the policy of Kaiser not to treat cataracts as long as vision can be corrected to better than 20/50, while ignoring the fact my vision decreased significantly over the past year (-9 to -11 in my left eye).

The thing was, I was willing to accept all that until I went to my PCP again for another eye infection, after which he referred me to the ophthalmologist for cataract evaluation. (Something I wasn't even thinking about after the comments by the optometrist.)

After less than a one minute examination by the ophthalmologist, she recommended cataract surgery.

For me it was all a learning experience, but that's why I thought it was amazing.

Next time I'll talk to you first. :)
2:05 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Fatigue! Part II - Maybe it is real?

Or it's actually Motivational Deficiency Disorder, MoDeD (pronounced Mo-Dee-Dee) for short. In a report this week by Roy Moynihan who reports for the British Medical Journal Austrailian scientists may have come across the reason for extreme laziness . The condition is claimed to affect up to one in five Australians and is characterised by overwhelming and debilitating apathy. Neuroscientists at the University of Newcastle in Australia say that in severe cases motivational deficiency disorder can be fatal, because the condition reduces the motivation to breathe. Neurologist Leth Argos is part of the team that has identified the disorder, which can be diagnosed using a combination of positron emission tomography and low scores on a motivation rating scale, previously validated in elite athletes. "This disorder is poorly understood," Professor Argos told the BMJ. "It is underdiagnosed and undertreated." Who knew? Maybe I have MoDeD, from my attempts to become a...
Post a Comment
Read more

My concerns reaffirmed today

When I was first diagnosed with MCL, I pretty much read just about everything I could get my hands on, I attended various conferences, and I talked to anyone who would listen. One of the most important lessons I learned, and which I've mentioned numerous times before was No one cares more about you than you. But in addition to that, I learned to fear the drug Doxorubicin , AKA Adriamycin, Doxil, Hydroxydoxorubicin, or more affectionately the Red Devil. Besides being a deadly chemical, as is the case with most chemotherapy drugs, it is one of the few chemotherapy drugs known to cause permanent heart damage. I even heard Dr. Sandra Horning , a noted Stanford lymphoma specialist, state at the first lymphoma conference I attended in LA, there was no evidence Doxorubicin provided any added benefit to chemotherapy protocols. This was music to my ears, since Doxorubicin is very common in most lymphoma treatment protocols. And even though Dr. Horning has since changed her tune [which my sk...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tacitly condoning racism?

I learned something very discouraging in my current events class yesterday, there are a lot more racists and bigots out there then you may think. They may not admit it, or they'll claim otherwise, but when someone says they place the blame for what happened in Charlottesville on both sides, or better yet, they don't know where the blame lays, then they are condoning the action of the white supremacists groups, and in my book that is a racist/bigot. The truth is, there should be no doubt where blame for Charlottesville lays. It lays with the white supremacists, neo-Nazi's, KKK, etc, plain and simple! The hatred, bigotry, and misogyny displayed and espoused by these groups, coupled with the tacit approval of President Trump needs to be confronted at all cost, and history tells us so. If only the Jews, in pre-WWII Germany, had confronted the Nazi's in the same manner, Hitler might never have risen to power, and we would not be looking at the prospect of a  third anti...
Post a Comment
Read more