eye doctors

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

[cross-posted to Menotomy, Davis_Square, and my LJ]
I see eye doctors every year or two, but I don't usually feel a strong personal attachment to them. Sometimes I go home thinking, "That was a disaster. I'm never going THERE again." More often I go home thinking, "Well, that probably wasn't more unpleasant than it needed to be." But when I change health insurance plans, it never bothers me if the last eye doctor I saw is not covered under the new plan.

My new HMO suggested some ophthalmologists in Arlington, North Cambridge, and Davis Square. (I'd rather not travel further, if I don't have to.) As most of them are in only 4 offices, I thought some of you might be able to tell me about your experiences with them. They are at:
366 Mass Ave (in Arlington, just east of the center)
281 Mass Ave (in Arlington, near Bates Road)
2285 Mass Ave (north Cambridge, near the bikeway crossing)
40 Holland St (Davis Square)

I'm looking for an ophthalmologist who is not pushy about getting fat patients to lose weight, or about trying to sell laser surgery to nearsighted patients. (I don't know if some doctors have forgotten how vulnerable a person feels with eyes dilated and some stranger's fingers on the eyelid, or if they're using that vulnerability on purpose.) If you've had visual field measurements, I'd like to know how they handled those. For routine eye exams, they just hold that little light in different places and ask if you can see it with your peripheral vision. But for diagnosing some kinds of neurological or retinal problems, they need to map the visual field in much more detail. There are different ways of doing it, and some are said to be less uncomfortable than others.

Comments

[docorion.livejournal.com]

In general, if visual field examination is uncomfortable, they're doing it wrong.

A Goldman perimetry analyzer is basically a bowl with fixed or moving projected lights. You have one eye covered, but your chin in the cup, and push the button whenever you see the lights. It's the most common method, and the one used by Scott Sylvia, the optometrist I go to.(2038 Mass Ave in Cambridge, co-located with General Optical).

Most new eye docs (of whatever stripe) will mention laser surgery at least once, because it's popular, and a money maker. Scott mentioned it to me once, I told him I wasn't interested, and he hasn't mentioned it again, which has been my experience with most eye docs. (OTOH, I'm also a doc myself, which discourages pushy behaviour on the part of other docs :-)

[syntheticnature.livejournal.com]

I go to Scott Sylvia's office too and neither he nor his colleague, um, whose name I've completely forgotten... anyway, neither of them have pressured me to consider laser surgery. And I'm not a doc.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Thanks for recommending Scott Sylvia, but he's not in my HMO. I don't mind having relatively few choices about this, but it still comes down to not having much choice.

[exsplusohs.livejournal.com]

I go to Parrelli Optical (http://parrellioptical.com/) in Porter Square and have only had positive experiences there. If you pay a little extra, you can get a retinal scan instead of having your eyes dilated (and the retinal scan is pretty awesome, the woman I saw explained all the different parts of the scan to me). I'm a fatty fatty two-by-four and no one said anything about losing weight. She did ask me about my blood pressure and cholesterol, but when I said they were both fine, we moved on. Laser surgery never came up, but granted my prescription is pretty light.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the recommendation. I did go to Parrelli, once (to get safety glasses for work), but they're not covered under my current insurance.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I have no idea why an eye doctor would say anything at all about your weight. Sounds like someone did, though...

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

I have no idea why an eye doctor would say anything at all about your weight. Sounds like someone did, though..

With the guy in New York in the early 1990s, I think it was just general intrusiveness, as a person sometimes hears socially. With the guy in Boston, 6 or 7 years ago, we were talking about a new medication I was taking to prevent migraines. One of its many disturbing side effects is to increase the risk of glaucoma (low probability, but scary.) He said it was really amazing, "we prescribe a lot of it for weight loss--great stuff." Sure, he can prescribe whatever he likes. A doctor is a doctor. And maybe "we" meant his hospital rather than his ophthalmology clinic. I hadn't mentioned how much the drug had decreased my migraines, or how hard it was to cope with the mood and memory side effects. He just patted my knee, encouraged me to stay with the [drug name], and I shut up until I could get out of there.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

Diabetes can affect vision, and many doctors who aren't specialists think that high body weight is a cause of diabetes, rather than a symptom of the same underlying insulin issues that can lead to type II diabetes.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

I should say "a potential symptom" because obviously not all people with high body weight have insulin issues, and not all people with type II diabetes have high body weights.

[elements.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately many doctors are just assholes about weight, and feel that as a doctor it's their duty to chide any fat person about their weight regardless of their specialty or what the patient came in to have treated. I've had that kind of intrusiveness from dentists!

My my experiences have been fine at the Davis Square Harvard Vanguard office. I disliked one doctor (who grabbed my contacts out of my eyes without giving me a chance to be prepared or to take them out myself), but he's no longer there.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

This doesn't answer your question, but if you have retinal issues, you should definitely be seeing someone specialized in retinology, not just a general opthamologist.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

At this point, I don't know. It could just be ocular migraines. But I think I should see an ophthalmologist, rather than an optometrist. And I don't think I should skip the visual field test because it makes me motion-sick, or triggers migraines, or just because I'm scared of it.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

Oh, definitely start with an opthamologist!

I assumed you were just looking for a new one, rather than 'haven't seen one about issue X yet." A retinologist is just a specialized ophthalmologist.

Good luck with the testing, and I hope you get some answers.

[joylewis.livejournal.com]

If 40 Holland Street is the Harvard Vanguard office, I've seen eye doctors there for years, and had the visual field test done there too. (Boring, but not painful in the least.)

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

I hadn't realized the Blue Cross HMO would point me to Harvard Vanguard. But I checked the address, and it looks like that's exactly what they did. You had good experiences with Dr Wong, Lofuto, or Kirszot?

[babstaah.livejournal.com]

I've never seen Dr Wong, Lofuto, or Kirszot at Harvard Vanguard but I have seen
Dr. Charles Robertson there and he did accept Blue Cross HMO.