optoblog.com

My career started out as a government optometrist. I idolized private practice optometry and demonized commercial practice. I did this so much that I forsook my excellent career in the Indian Health Service, hired a practice consultant, and started my own private practice. Of course, I had to work commercial to make ends meet while I built the practice. The only problem is that becomes a catch-22. I had to work four days a week at Wal-Mart to afford what became my hobby practice two days a week. I couldn’t work enough in my private practice to build it, but if I didn’t work enough in the commercial practice, then I couldn’t pay the bills for the private practice to stay open.

Now the private practice has miserably and utterly failed. There is no return from paying back the practice loan or the remaining months on the lease, but at least the commercial practice easily covers these expenses. I have closed down Summit Vision Center and now I will focus all my energy into VisionHealth EyeCare.

This blog will now take a new direction. I will be advocating commercial practice, demonizing private practice, and waxing nostalgic of government practice (but not idolizing it since I’m a conservative republican that doesn’t believe in big government).

My big beef with commercial used to be that they provided substandard care. Well, the truth is that individual doctors were providing substandard care. Not detecting or treating glaucoma and not having a TPA license to treat medical eye conditions is simply substandard care regardless of where one practices. I’ve seen private practice optometrists who didn’t even have a BIO.

In future posts I intend to show how independent, commercial practice (and in particular Wal-Mart) is the best modality for optometrists. I’ll show you how I create quality care in my practice, and along the way you will see how my practice evolves to become even better.

So subscribe to the site feed and enjoy the ride.

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