The second clinic was, like the first, a pretty flashy operation with a nicely designed office and modern furniture. There I met with a technician who measured my eyes using what I presume was a corneal topographer. He told me I was a candidate for LASIK. I then met briefly with an opthamologist to discuss any questions about the procedure. After that, I met with their sales person, who booked me for mid-January at a lower price than clinic #1 had quoted. So far, so good. And then I went home and did some more online research about complications. That's when I found out that the head surgeon at clinic #2 had a malpractice judgement against him, the basis of which was that he had advised two patients who were not suitable candidates for LASIK that they would be fine. After performing the procedure, both developed severe complications (corneal ectasia). That freaked me out a bit - no, wait, a lot! - and I decided to get a third opinion.
The third clinic I visited was Ny Eye Specialists, run by Dr Ken Moadell. He claims a reputation for being conservative and for turning away up to 30% of people who come in for consultations as poor candidates for LASIK. After reading about potential complications – and probably getting unnecessarily worried – this was the kind of input I wanted.
Arriving at clinic #3, I was a bit turned off at first. It's a large, busy space, with a less-than-posh atmosphere; certainly less flash than clinics 1 and 2. The staff were immediately nice and helpful though. After waiting for 30 minutes or so and watching, with a slightly malfunctioning headset, an introductory video about the surgeon and the procedures, complete with testimonials from patients and staff, I met with an optometrist to examine my eyes. She did an excellent job of not only evaluating my corneas and giving me her recommendation, but also explaining what she was doing, how she and the machine were doing it, and why. Beyond that, she actually turned the monitor displaying the digitized images of my cornea and showed me what she was talking about. This made me feel very comfortable and informed. The important info here was that although my corneas were of exactly average thickness (550 microns), the shape of my corneas was irregular, meaning that LASIK was not the preferred option in her opinion.
After the optometrist's examination, I met with the surgeon who would be operating the laser to correct my vision. This was a new experience for me, as it had not happened at either clinic #1 or #2. After looking at printouts of my corneal topographs, the surgeon confirmed the optometrist's opinion that LASIK would be less ideal and that PRK would be safer, and told me that he would not perform LASIK on my eyes, but would do PRK if I chose to have it done. He explained that, given my perscription (OS -4.25, OD -4.75 with a 0.25 astigmatism), the thickness and health of my corneas, and my age, he expected a very high likelihood of very good results (20/20 vision or better). He then discussed the pros and cons of PRK surgery, explaining the procedure in detail, and recommended that I have the surgery done in one eye at a time at least a few weeks apart, which would allow me to get back to work more quickly, minimize the risk of simultaneous infections in both eyes, and allow him to adjust the second procedure based on how the first eye healed to prevent over or under-correction.
Satisfied that I was as well-informed as I was going to get, and confident in this clinic's more conservative assessment of the most appropriate treatment for my eyes, I booked my first surgery for January 6, with the second eye tentatively scheduled for January 24. The quoted price was higher than either clinic #1 or #2 (much higher than #2, but actually very close to clinic #1), but I was particularly impressed with the quality of the staff and their efforts to respond to all my questions.
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