When Your Life Fades Away, Who Can You Run To?

It may be time to update your prescription lenses! Optometrists can easily update your prescription, some even boasting within-the-hour service while you wait.

The actual profession of optometry may confuse some patients to believe that they are qualified doctors. In fact, no-- optometrists don’t have a medical degree or an M.D. following their name—they could more accurately be described as a kind of eye nurse. Many optometrists operate independently of doctors offices for the convenience of their patients, but correspond with a network of other doctors in case they need to refer you to an opthamologist—who deal with eye diseases—or a physician of another specialty field. For the most part, optometrists stay within the focus of their field, testing your eyes, writing prescriptions for new lenses, and sometimes even prescribing behavioral optometrists eye exercises to strengthen the focusing ability of your peepers.

Like most registered nurses, optometrists O.D. are licensed to dole out prescriptions for minor eye problems—regular conjunctivitis (pink eye)? No sweat! Chronic dry eye syndrome? Many optometrists can prescribe more than your average o.t.c. artificial tear Visine, but Restasis that both moisturizes one’s eyes and helps promote future tear production. Your optometrist can tell you, such a prescription is vital; untreated chronic dry eye can make one’s eyesight worse.

What other services can optometrists provide? Optometrists can also afford their patients routine lasik eye procedures that will keep them from falling ill from drastic eye diseases…

Optometrists and Lasik Eye Procedures

Many potential Lasik patients don’t realize how miraculously non-invasive its procedures truly are. As they are non-surgical, most optometrists are fully capable of performing lasik eye procedures. Some minor procedures that optometrists can do via lasik lasers include repairing retinal tears, macular holes, and even clean the surface of the retina(in the back of the eye) to prevent crippling eye diseases like macular degeneration. Many optometrists can also eliminate the extra blood vessels that grow within the vitreous gel (the mass inside of an eyeball) that plague the patient with diabetic retinopathy.

It bears repeating that a diabetic with eye complications is much better suited toward seeing a qualified opthamologist M.D. Diabetics with more serious eye complications like cataracts and diabetic retinopathy should absolutely consult with an opthamologist, who’s bound to have a better understanding of how their disease is impacting their sight—an optometrist has no power to prescribe medicinal marijuana to the glaucoma patient, for instance.

Should You Consult With an Opthamologist Before Undergoing Drastic Lasik Sight Procedures?

Especially an elderly patient might benefit from consulting with ophthalmologists—more than just an optometrist—before undergoing reconstructive sight “refractive” lasik surgery. Recovery time is in fact minimal, but an elderly patient’s recovery might be impacted by the medications that they’re on—those with heart disease could have recovery setbacks. Additionally, the elderly are incredibly susceptible to a wide host of eye diseases. How could a sight-reparative lasik eye treatment affect a disease they might not know they have, like diabetic retinopathy? If you have severe glaucoma or cataracts, you are also considered ineligible.

Peruse the window of sight that affords lasik eligibility…the following can undergo refractive lasik surgery:

• myopia: 0.75 to -12.00

• hyperopia: +0.75 to +4.50

• astigmatism: +/- 0.75 to +/- 6.00

For more eligibility requirements, call the toll-free number listed on this screen or click on the convenient contact for more!