Lasik Company changes name, now specializes in Dry Eye.

[RDAC]

This reads like an article from The Onion.

"If you're one of 22 million people nationwide who suffer daily from dry eyes, the Dry Eye Clinic at our eight NVISON Laser Eye Centers throughout Southern California can offer you comfort and relief with a variety of treatment options," said Dr. Tom Tooma, the Medical Director for NVISION Laser Eye Centers, formerly part of TLC Laser Eye Centers, and renowned eye surgeon who has performed more than 100,000 vision correction procedures.

http://www.marketwire.com/press-rele...om-1332800.htm

[Lucy]

RDAC- I can't -arrrghhhhhhh- believe this article. I must say I don't know what the Onion is. I did a quick search online and got the idea. Nothing I care to spend time looking at.

TLC....the big, fat, Lasik slaughter chain.....is now touting itself as "dry eye centers?" I did see IPL in there as likely the only thing that is new. The other list of things is what we've learned on our own for the past 10+ years and also with the help of Dry Eye Zone.

They have the clinical set-up so now they are hunting for dry eye patients!!
I read the causes of "dry eye" and surprisingly, Lasik is not on the list. Surprise. Lasik is listed as a cause of dry eye along with the rest of the stuff on bottles of dry eye tears on the market. When I had Lasik 10 years ago, drs denied that Lasik caused dry eye. Flat out denied it. For some time after that too. It was probably in the past five or fewer years that dry eye tear companies began cashing in on Lasik dry eye.

After that, it was easy for others to climb on board and claim the same thing. As long as they weren't the butchers doing the surgery. But, now, times have changed and even the drs/butchers are in it for the money. I am sickened by this. I hope no one who has dry eye gives the former Lasik docs one penny towards treatment and seeks out optometrists or ophthalmologists who did not perform Lasik. Lucy

[Guest]

My first reaction was annoyance that they would dare make money from dry eye patients when they themselves are, in fact, causing dry eye.

Then I thought that maybe it's a good thing after all because for those patients who end up like me, at least their surgeon will hopefully have half a clue about how to best treat their dry eye... maybe with early, appropriate treatment, outcomes like mine can be truly kept to an absolute minimum.

Then I actually READ the article, and was rather pissed off that they had the nerve to conveniently leave out refractive surgery as a cause of dry eye... I mean COME ON!!! Seriously?? You've got to be kidding me! Mind you, I suppose it's not surprising, given that the article was a press release from NVISION themselves.

Then I clicked on the link to the NVISION's website... read through their info to see if they might do a good job of explaining the risks of refractive surgery... lo and behold, they make refractive surgery sound no more risky than a tooth cleaning at the dentist. So now I'm steaming mad...

hmmmm... must try harder not to read things that will peeve me off right before bedtime.

[Michael2]

Not to defend anyone, but at the last IPL I went to, there were a few docs from TLC...

They were incredibly sincere and understanding...I think they went out to Memphis expecting to find out about this random IPL thing, and then they heard the patient stories and the life impact and were astonished. I know they were looking to make money too, but at least they were pretty caring (or pretended to be).

So the way I look at it is if more and more people are looking into dry eye, that can't possibly be a bad thing. In fact it's a GREAT thing. The more docs know about it, the better people can be treated. Especially people like me who did nothing, living a happy life and woke up with severe dry eyes in the early 20s. I know I'm not the only one so if the info can reach some other person, then great

[Guest]

So the way I look at it is if more and more people are looking into dry eye, that can't possibly be a bad thing. In fact it's a GREAT thing. The more docs know about it, the better people can be treated. Especially people like me who did nothing...

And that is true... I am mostly annoyed by the fact that they are apparently still glossing over the fact that Lasik is a cause of life altering dry eye... patients need to be able to make informed decisions about that. Come to think of it, maybe more surgeons need to be informed about the real risks themselves... I wonder what they are told about dry eye and LASIK when they are trained to do the procedure?

And I know that most LASIK surgeons are NOT uncaring jerks... I suspect most of them honestly think they are doing a good thing for patients when they perform LASIK... and hey, if they can make bucketfuls of money doing it, who WOULDN'T do the same thing in their position? You think you're doing this great and wonderful thing for people AND making money at the same time... sounds good, right?

But boy do I ever wish someone would do a rock solid study evaluating the true incidence of life-altering complications from LASIK... I suspect the surgery would fall out of fashion very quickly if such a study were ever done.

And as for the especially people like you who did nothing part, well, I assume you didn't mean that the way it sounded. But since I know there ARE people out there who think post-LASIK people brought this on themselves and therefore should just suck it up and quit complaining, I'll say this:

I think everyone with severe dry eye is equally deserving and in need of good treatment... even those of us who had LASIK thought we were doing ourselves a huge favour... as stupid and naive as it may sound to many people, I'd say the vast majority (if not all) trusted that it was a safe procedure... We truly were led to believe that THIS psycho dry eye outcome was one that did not occur in properly screened patients such as ourselves.