Cataracts

I discovered that I had cataracts in spring of 2006.
While driving a "lorrie" on one of the antique buying trips in England, I really noticed that I was having increasing difficulty reading the traffic signs, even with my distance-improving glasses on. One of the closer friends I had at the time had undergone Lasik surgery and was absolutely eagle-eyed. Once back in the US, I made an appointment for a free consultation.
He Lasik people were not about to do any surgery on me based on the fact that I had only one functioning eye to begin with. While disappointing, the experience proved some value. My slowing increasing diminishment was determined to be due to cataract, and not to plain old nearsightedness or to any retina problem. I greeted both those things as good news.
Yet one aspect of the examination lingered in my brain: why, when I had been going to Dr. Lowenstein two or three times a year for the past couple years did I first learn of what was a relatively large cataract from a free Lasik consultation? The arrangement of Lowenstein’s practice did not quite make him an economical option for this self pay patient. Upon every visit, I had to pay Dr. Lowenstein. Then, a bill of another couple hundred dollars would come from The Massachusetts ye and Ear Infirmary in the following weeks. For so much money in double billing, why had it never been even casually mentioned to me that I had a cataract? I don’t bemoan paying for services, but I do want some bang for my buck.
I asked about the cataract on my next visit in the summer of 2006. I was told that I was scheduled for a retina exam only, and that if I wasn’t another issue looked at, I needed to make another appointment.
I never did make another appointment with Lowenstein or anyone else at Mass Eye. Instead, I started seeing Dr. Woodcomb in Providence. That professional relationship lasted about three years, until his doubt that "Cialis causes any eye problems." I could live with Lowenstein’s skepticism about the 2003 cornea abrasion because I was by that time seeing him for routine evaluation. I couldn’t live with Woodcomb’s doubts because I needed someone who would treat me according to the facts, not according to pharmaceutical propaganda.