Step #1 to Getting Rid of Glasses Webinar: May 22nd

[00:00:00] Well, hello, everybody. Welcome. It is the strike of 12 noon and this is the CLR webinar for May 22nd 2024. Uh, my name is Sharif Madhavi. I’m the chief experience officer here at the Laser Eye Center of Silicon Valley, and we have an esteemed panel. Our surgeons, Dr. Craig Bindi, Dr. Joe Ling, and also Renee, a CLR patient who will be answering your questions, but also will be sharing her experience a little later on in our webinar.

[00:00:34] We’ll plan for this to go somewhere between 35 and 45 minutes, depending on how many questions come in. And on the bottom of your screen, you will see a Q& A button. So I’m going to ask you to please If you have a question, submit it on the Q and a button, not in the chat, because the chat is too hard for us to monitor.

[00:00:52] So we’ll be looking at the Q and a button there and we will work hard to, um, to answer all the questions here. Um, I do want to start off by just making an announcement. You see it on the screen here. Jack Armstrong. That is probably the last picture you’ll see of him wearing gloves. He is our newest C. L.

[00:01:10] R. Patient and Dr Ling had the privilege of performing his C. L. R. Procedure yesterday. Dr Ling, you saw him this morning on his first day after. How is he doing? He’s doing fantastic. Uh, you know, he was very nervous. Going into it. He actually talked about on the air this morning. I was able to catch on to that and, uh, and he got through it just fine.

[00:01:30] He got through it great, actually. And like he said, he felt no pain and he did wonderfully. And then this morning when he woke up, he went on and do it, did a show. I just tell my patients take like at least a day off, but he’s just, he goes hard. And then he came in for his post op. It was 2020 today for distance and he’s actually reading quite well.

[00:01:50] Yeah. Uh, without even us doing any adjustments for him and the vision will continue to improve for him. I told him. So, yeah, he’s doing fabulous. Just a day out. That’s great. That’s great. Fantastic news. We’re so happy for him. And, uh, some of you are on this webinar because you heard, uh, Jack Armstrong promoting it on KSFO and I believe he’ll be talking about this more and more in the coming days and weeks, which is great.

[00:02:16] Um, uh, We you have the Q and a button. I’ve already mentioned that. So if you have a question, please submit it there. Um, what we want to do today is really help you understand what happens to your eyes as they age. And we have four main topics we’re going to cover. We are going to talk about this procedure called custom lens replacement and how it’s different from LASIK, which we’ve been performing LASIK now for over 25 years at the Laser Eye Center.

[00:02:41] What’s the recovery like? How much does it cost? Is it covered by insurance? Just prevent future cataracts. We have a whole bunch of questions that we are going to go through and really at the end of it, help you learn what is going on, maybe a little more with your eyes and how we might be able to help you.

[00:02:56] So with that, I’m going to turn it over to Dr. Bindi and Dr. Bindi, if you’d, uh, if you just talk a little bit about how LASIK works and, uh, maybe how it’s a little similar and a little different from CLR. Sure. I can go over that and welcome everybody. Thanks for taking time out of your Wednesday to be with us and learn what we do every single day.

[00:03:16] And, um, well, I think first of all, patients will come into our office. They could be from 18 years old to 80 years old, and they come in with a problem. And, and then our, our, our role is to figure out how to, how to fix the problem. Um, especially if someone’s in their younger age frame, uh, teens, uh, as long as their prescription is stable, 20s, 30s, and 40s, a lot of time LASIK is the thing to do.

[00:03:41] And, um, people are familiar with the word of LASIK, you know, LASIK has been around for 25 plus years. And so I’ll talk about LASIK. That’s what my career has been really geared toward. Um, and then we’ll talk a lot about CLR, but what, what laser vision correction does when you do a LASIK procedure, these are procedures that fix the prescription.

[00:03:58] So if somebody wears glasses or contact lenses that are prescription, um, let’s say they’re nearsighted or they have a stigmatism, farsightedness, we can use a laser to reshape the front of the eye with a outpatient comfortable procedure. Uh, it’s called LASIK and it works amazingly well. Um, As your friends have probably told you over the years, I had LASIK 20 years ago as well.

[00:04:20] Um, What LASIK doesn’t do, LASIK does not block aging. And so as people move through their, especially through their 50s and 60s, Uh, there’s a secondary issue that happens with age where the lens begins to change. At first it gets a little bit less flexible and near vision might drop off. Down the road it gets a little bit yellowed or discolored.

[00:04:40] Eventually it gets cloudy and we start to use the word cataract. And so, um, when people come in and they see Dr. Ling or myself, Um, a lot of times age can help us navigate, you know, what’s going to be a good procedure. If it’s a laser treatment, um, that’s, that’s generally what I do and often I’ll say we’re seeing some lens changes and maybe Dr.

[00:05:00] Ling is the, the surgeon of choice and they might do a procedure like Jack Armstrong did with, with CLR. Well and here we’ve got, uh, we’ve got the anatomy. I brought that up so we can see what the eye looks like. And. that front surface. And th Dr Lane to talk about the at the structure of the v of the eye, you can see t the top, that’s the corne going across it right the puts a contact lens on th the cornea and when we us that very front part of t can reshape the cornea to treat the prescription.

[00:05:37] Um, and then below it, if you can move the cursor down to the lens inside the eye, the, that’s the natural human lens, and, uh, that’s what changes, that’s really the aging part of the eye, and sometime around 45, 50, the lens gets less flexible, and that’s when people start to notice They’re needing reading glasses, or they, their glasses turn into bifocals, or they just can’t see up close like they used to.

[00:06:01] And so that’s when people often will come in, uh, trying to find out should they do LASIK or a procedure like CLR. And, and they’ll often say, I used to be able to see great up close, and then something began to change, began to change. And, um, in 2024, it’s really not too much to ask to be able to drive to a restaurant and also see the menu, or to be able to look at your laptop and computer.

[00:06:21] And also, drive home or watch a movie. These are all things that are well within our reach, what we can, what we can do. And since Dr. Ling is a specialist in these lens treatments like CLR, um, we can turn it over to Dr. Ling to talk a little bit more about, uh, the lens and dysfunctional lens syndrome and, and what, what, how we fix it.

[00:06:42] Dr. Ling, you want to tell us a little bit about CLR? Yeah, thank you Dr. Bindi. So yeah, so Dr. Bindi described, you know, the difference between LASIK and CLR in an excellent way, in that, you know, LASIK is great for, typically for patients below the age of 50, and, and that’s because LASIK can treat the, uh, The inherent need for glasses that someone may be born with.

[00:07:06] So if someone started in glasses, they, since they were a teenager, that’s in some ways, just how they develop the need for glasses, they still don’t have the age related, uh, changes that create an additional need for more glasses, basically it’s great for that. But after. Typically around 40, 45, you start to develop, uh, an age related change.

[00:07:28] And what Sharif is demonstrating right here with this video is a lens that’s inside the eye that we are all born with that can basically stretch and refocus and, and basically allow a young eye to be able to see far and near. Unfortunately, Uh, this is not last forever. Typically after around 45, that lens, uh, its ability to refocus diminishes dramatically, and that’s because that lens is hardening up.

[00:08:00] It’s starting to lose its flexibility, loses optical quality, like a nice clear lens, It’s turning into a fog glass over time, and the slide that Sharif now is showing shows a normal lens, a young normal lens on the left hand side. Light goes in very nicely, and as it starts to lose its flexibility and clarity, we call that an aging lens.

[00:08:23] There’s a term for it, dysfunctional lens syndrome, and that causes scattering of light. You may notice, uh, difficulty driving at night. You may also develop more and more need for reading glasses. That’s why when someone starts wearing reading glasses. And their prescription goes up each year. It’s not because they’re becoming addicted to needing reading glasses, because actually that lens is progressing along its normal track of needing more reading glasses to be able to still keep the focus of that reading intact.

[00:08:53] And the next step beyond dysfunctional lens syndrome is cataract. So we’re all on this linear track to develop worse vision, unfortunately, due to age. So when we look at solutions. You could do glasses to try to mitigate the impact of aging, um, or you can look at addressing the solution at its root cause.

[00:09:16] So an age, age related problem would then require an age based solution. And that’s what custom lens replacement is. We’re replacing the dysfunctional lens that we all develop. And we’ll gradually develop into a cataract with a procedure that replaces that with a synthetic lens and technology has gotten so good that synthetic lenses today will be able to achieve much higher quality vision than what a dysfunctional lens could provide.

[00:09:44] So, Dr. Lang, a lot of people ask us when they come in, um, CLR procedure? How do you answer that? Yeah. So if, if you understand what lens replacement truly is, then the, the answer, uh, should be obvious that no, you want to actually not develop CAC anymore because by replacing the dysfunctional lens with a synthetic lens, you have to remove the source of which cataract would develop from.

[00:10:12] So even if you do have a cataract, you can still be a candidate for custom lens replacement because we will just take care of that cataract. As well, but many of our patients, uh, they’ve been told, well, you are not ready for a cataract surgery. You don’t have a cataract yet, but that’s more of a, a subjective definition in terms of aging of the eyes.

[00:10:32] Uh, people are already developing gradual cataracts in their fifties before someone says you have a cataract, you’re already in the process of having a cloudier and cloudier lens with each year. Got it. And Dr Bindi, you know, one of the advantages that our patients tell us about having a C. L. R. Procedure is that they have it with us literally in our facility.

[00:10:56] And why is that important? Well, uh, the concept of office based surgery is, is, um, really in lines with our philosophy at the Laser Eye Center, where, um, for so many years, people would come in for a LASIK treatment, and they would literally walk into our office, and they’d be there for, they’d walk into the procedure room for about 15 minutes, have their treatment, get a ride home, and be back to normal the next day.

[00:11:20] And we just described this as a LASIK experience and we just got used to it. And then, um, we would see how people would do cataract surgery and lens treatments and they would go to a hospital and it would be a whole different, uh, a whole different set of people that are taking care of them. They were getting IV lines and it was just, it was just an unfamiliar process to them.

[00:11:39] And we would see this difference between the LASIK experience and a lens replacement experience, and I think one of the things that I really liked about Dr. Ling is our philosophy toward the patient experience. Um, really merging a LASIK experience and the procedure CLR. So now when people do CLR, it almost looks as if they had a LASIK procedure.

[00:11:58] They’ll come into our office, they’re in the office for say an hour or so, the procedure that takes 5 10 minutes per eye. It doesn’t hurt. Um, they’re with the same staff that did their, their eye exam. Um, and at the end, they get a ride home and within the next day or two, they can start to resume their normal activities.

[00:12:17] So, so it’s, it’s been evolving, um, to make office based surgery in our office. So CLR is a LASIK like procedure and it’s just comfortable. No, it’s truly, it’s truly incredible. I’m talking to patients right now. After they’ve had it done. It’s so neat to see their reaction and they just get up and walk out.

[00:12:35] Uh, it’s a different paradigm than what people might have thought about in the past. So, um, Dr. Ling, you also do LASIK surgery as well as CLR. But, um, can you have CLR if you’ve had LASIK in the past? Absolutely, you can. Um, again, having now understand, kind of gone through, you know, what LASIK is great for, then you can imagine that, you know, someone had LASIK 25, years ago is now, you know, in their 50s, 60s, LASIK were great for them, life changing.

[00:13:08] But then the aging process continues onwards and to which they may start need glasses again. And many times people would think, well, my LASIK were off and, and, and to be more. direct about it. It’s not so much that the LASIK wore off. It’s that the person in which the LASIK was correcting for has changed as you know, because we’re always changing and due to age.

[00:13:31] So the age related component now becomes center stage and you can absolutely have custom lens replacement to restore that high quality vision that you were accustomed to after having had LASIK. And we were specifically dedicated to take care of our patients for their entire life. So if a patient Had a LASIK with Dr.

[00:13:50] Bindi, uh, you know, years ago and they come back because they know us and they love the service they got and they want to see what options there are. We will give them a full evaluation to see if they’re a good candidate for, for, you know, that, that next stage of vision and many of times it’s custom lens replacement.

[00:14:12] You know, one of the questions, Dr. Ling, that’s come on is just, how is this different from traditional cataract surgery? So, custom lens replacement and traditional cataract surgery are very different in terms of goals. Cataract surgery is more of a reactive procedure, meaning that you’re really waiting for someone to really develop quite a degree of debilitation.

[00:14:35] And then someone will tell you, you are ready for cataract surgery. Um, so the goal is really to, Um, kind of salvage the vision after a tremendous amount of degradation has gone by. That’s why many patients have been told, I’m not ready for cataract surgery, uh, because my doctor told me, I’m not, it’s not ready yet.

[00:14:54] And even though the patient has stopped driving at nighttime, they’re, they’re losing, uh, uh, ability to do things they used to love doing. Custom lens replacement is a proactive approach to vision. In which we, we now know that the, the, the degradation you get from age related changes of that lens happens way earlier than before cataract shows up so that we would address this in a proactive preemptive way.

[00:15:21] This lens is already degraded to a point where it is causing you to need to wear glasses, even quality of vision is degrading. We address it with lens replacement, which will also happen to your cataracts and were prevented while using very high end lenses and techniques. To correct for the vision for the rest of your life and preempting that need for cataract surgery as well.

[00:15:44] You know, I think a lot of, a lot of people might also add, um, a question. They say, well, I wear glasses. Will CLR also get me out of glasses if I have prescription, I have nearsightedness, if I have astigmatism? And so, one of the concepts that, um, I just want people to think about is, The lens that we pick, it’s a lens that can fix distance vision and it can treat for prescription.

[00:16:05] Likely it’s like near sadness, stigmatism and far sadness. And it also has the ability to help near vision. So it fixes both distance vision and near vision. And then since that lens is an inanimate object, it doesn’t age or change or degrade like the human lens. That’s what we see in every cataracts. And that’s why it’s permanent.

[00:16:22] And Dr. Benjamin, I’ve put some, uh, I put some of the different, uh, implants that you use? Because we’re getting a few questions like what are the material? What is this made out of it? Is it as flexible as a young person’s lens? Will I have to replace this in the future? So, Dr. Lee, could you kind of do a summary on that?

[00:16:38] Yeah. So lens technology gotten extraordinarily good, but there are still, uh, limitations as well. And there are different types. And just like everything else in life, there’s no one size fit all. There’s a great lens for potentially each individual, and we really have to see which one fits each person. So just like Dr.

[00:16:58] Bindi mentioned just now, there are lenses that can help you see far and near that would best fit the category of a multifocal lens or extended depth of focus lens. That’s a great lens strategy, but it’s not right for each individual. We have the tools here at our office to assess whether an individual is a good candidate.

[00:17:17] For that type of lens. We also have very high and single focus lenses as well gives you extraordinarily high quality vision, uh, has less range, but we have strategies to account for that lack of range using a single focus lens. So we also employ strategies such as blended vision or monovision. In our custom lens replacement to help someone be able to see young again, be able to see far and near so for each individual, they simply need to come in for an evaluation to see whether they’re a good candidate for custom lens replacement and which strategy would best fit their eyes and their current situation and their needs.

[00:17:59] You know, a common scenario is people will come in and let’s say they had LASIK 15, 20 years ago, they’ll come and say, maybe it’s time for a LASIK touch up. And sometimes that is the most appropriate thing. We can do a touch up to fine tune distance or near with a laser. And other times we’ll say, that’s really not going to be the best fit, and then we might say a CLR procedure is appropriate.

[00:18:19] Also, lately I feel like we’ve seen a lot of people who come and they say, I’m all ready for my CLR procedure, let’s do this. And they might be at the younger spectrum, and we say, actually, in this scenario, maybe a laser treatment is going to be more appropriate. And so I always think the first step, um, is less about which is the best procedure.

[00:18:36] It’s really just trying to see what your measurements are like. And then that’s where Dr. Ling and I can come in and explain with your own personal measurements. We can explain our rationale to find out if it’s a laser based treatment, a lens based treatment. Um, and in my experience, about 80 percent of the time we’ll say we can do this and it should be a great process.

[00:18:55] There’s a good fit. And about 20 percent we’ll say, maybe it’s better. preferable to hold off and not do a procedure. Just sticking with glasses or contacts is sometimes the safest thing to do, but we don’t know until we get the measurements. So that’s the first step is to find out if you’re a candidate with our eye exam consultation.

[00:19:11] Right. So, so let’s shift a little bit and talk about day of the procedure. Dr. Ling, could you kind of walk us through what happens from when someone arrives and kind of walk us through the steps. So we do our procedure for custom lens replacement in our office space. Uh, surgical suite, which is an excellent way to do this procedure because it’s in a familiar, uh, facility in which you had your consultation and pre op, uh, with, and then it’s also a very patient centered experience, meaning that you come in, you see familiar faces that you’ve met before, and it is in a very comfortable setting, uh, not, not like a hospital sterile setting.

[00:19:53] And our patients are then, uh, greeted with our, uh, our pre and post op technicians and staff to get them ready. They’ll get, you know, uh, instructions on how to take care of their eyes afterwards. And then while they’re dilating, they get all that instruction. And then the procedure itself is just 10 minutes.

[00:20:11] It’s a 10 minute procedure in which you’re looking toward the bright light. You don’t see anything scary or unusual. You don’t watch your own procedure. And from your perspective, it’s just a beautiful light show for that duration. We have music playing in the background. We take requests and it happens very quickly and it’s done before you know it.

[00:20:30] And once you’re done, you don’t get banished up. You don’t get patched up. You just get a pair of sunglasses. And you can actually typically see well enough to just walk, uh, with your own vision to your driver who then takes you home for a good days of rest. We typically tell our patients just take a nap, go to bed early, vision will start off a little foggy.

[00:20:48] And in most cases, vision improved dramatically the next morning. Uh, like we talked about with Jack Armstrong, everyone’s a little different. So I always tell them, you know, next day when we see you have a driver on backup, some of our patients are driving in themselves the next day without glasses. And, uh, here at the slide.

[00:21:06] Well, we have a patient that had surgery just literally like 10 seconds ago here and she’s already pretty much ready to go home, take a nap, she has her sunglasses on, able to walk out and be able to see well enough to get in her car and have someone take her home. That’s great. And these are procedures where we, we don’t need to put in an IV.

[00:21:27] There’s no, there’s no, uh, blades or blood. This is just very comfortable procedure. The anesthesia is numbing eye drops for anesthesia and a pill of allium. People do get nervous. So the valium, um, helps just to settle down, take the edge off. And, um, and then Dr. Ling’s great at coaching his, his patients through to make sure that they’re comfortable.

[00:21:47] And, and we specialize in just vision correction procedures. So in our office space surgery suite, There’s not a hip replacement going on next door and a heart surgery next door. We do nothing but laser and lens treatments. And that’s what our staff is really, uh, um, so that’s what we specialize in. That’s all we do.

[00:22:05] help people see better. Well, and, and Dr. Mendi, just reiterate, please. Is there any pain involved with having this procedure? People don’t feel pain. People feel anxiety. In my experience, I think that’s what people come in. They feel anxious and the Valium helps. Um, we’re, we’re pretty attuned to the anxiety component and how to get people through, um, through this coaching through and keep them comfortable.

[00:22:28] Um, pain is not similar to LASIK. So, um, people usually will describe it as. Maybe a 0 out of 10 to maybe a 1 or a 2, but this does not rise to the level of, of, um, a painful process at all. Um, so no, I’d say pain’s not a part of it. Anxiety, slight discomfort or pressure. We have a patient here, Renee, who went through it.

[00:22:49] So I’ve had LASIK. So I know what that’s like to go through. Uh, we can talk to Renee about, um, from a patient’s perspective. Well, you’ve had LASIK, Dr. Ling’s had SMILE. I’ve had PRK and Renee’s had CLR. So we’ve got four of the five bases with this team, you know, Evo, ICL is another procedure we do. Uh, but Dr.

[00:23:08] Ling, I’d love you to talk about that, but really what we want to talk about because people are asking what are the complications, what could go wrong? What are the side effects? Can you touch on that? So if you want to understand the safety of custom lens replacement, you could look at cataract as a good model.

[00:23:25] Cataract surgery, that is. Cataract surgery is the most commonly performed outpatient procedure in the entire world because every one of us will develop cataract at some point. About something like 4 million surgeries are done each year worldwide. And you look at the safety data, and it’s extraordinarily good.

[00:23:43] You know, if you’re looking at having any one surgery done. You should put cataract surgery or lens replacement at the top of that list because the outcomes are extraordinary, you’re improving vision, which improves life, and, uh, it’s a ten minute procedure, it’s painless, and the complication rate are extraordinarily low.

[00:24:02] And what are the complications? Uh, most people should pay attention to that would be with any procedure, such as, uh, infection or inflammation. And if you look at the worldwide data for that, I think the most recent study quotes at about 0. 014%. And this is a global data. They’re looking at cataract surgery done in third world countries as well.

[00:24:25] Maybe with not as good access to sanitation and health care as we do here in the states, so extraordinarily low in the states, uh, probably even lower. We do sterile procedures here, give people very great medicine to take to, to, to prevent any complications. So, I would say we always look at things that we do every day in terms of, uh, benefit to risk ratio.

[00:24:48] Thankfully, it’s getting in our car, getting on a plane, having lens replacement surgery. So when you come in, what I do is I look at each individual and assess the risk with them and assess their needs and their benefits. So if you’re someone who’s healthy, no, no previous injuries, no eye conditions, whether you know about or we help you identify, we can let you know how that plays into what this surgery means for you, whether I myself would personally recommend it for you or advise you to, to, to hold off or look at other things.

[00:25:21] Or simply let you know, well, here are the things you should consider so you can make that decision for yourself. You know, Dr. Lange, I’m looking at a couple other questions. I’m just going to read this verbatim. How long will it take before you know something went wrong, which implies something went wrong?

[00:25:36] And if it does, is there a way to reverse it? So, you know, things going wrong are pretty atypical for custom lens replacement, uh, during the procedure itself. But, you know, in. In some ways, I am a, uh, an ultra specialist for lens replacement. I’m a fellowship trained, uh, lens replacement, refractive surgeon, cataract surgeon as well.

[00:26:01] So, just through the techniques that, you know, I’ve developed for myself, it’s a very, very, uh, minimally invasive, very quick recovery. And my ability, just simply by having done the sheer volume that I’ve done, should anything atypical arise, except for the And very comfortable with correcting that and having a best case scenario here.

[00:26:24] But in terms of noticing, uh, something, uh, atypical, typically if you were to notice something atypical, usually it would be within the first week, I would say. And that’s extraordinary, uh, you know, rare. Typically, we would say vision improves dramatically during the first day and things will continue to improve gradually throughout the first month.

[00:26:44] So, uh, the main important thing is just not so much that there’s, uh, a high tendency for a complication, there simply isn’t. This is considered an extraordinary safe procedure. I think the, the more, uh, pertinent part is just setting the right expectation. So, for every, any person that comes in, it’s all about understanding what are the tremendous benefits this procedure can provide, but also knowing, What are the limitations?

[00:27:08] Is there are still limitations as you hopefully have picked up their different types lenses. Some are multifocal, some are single focus, and certain individuals are better for one than the other. There are pros and cons. But largely when you’re a good candidate, that means the benefits are just extraordinarily, uh, uh, in your favor.

[00:27:26] And that knowing the right expectation helps you to have, uh, you know, comfort in knowing, Oh yeah, I can see great clock on the wall in front of my hand just the way that we expected it to be. And, and just to build on that, Dr. Ling, I would put an exclamation on that point because that’s really where the consultation comes in.

[00:27:45] This is a time, it’s not just about measurements, there’s a lot of that. Our advanced vision analysis, we’re taking over 1 million data points and we do get a lot of data, but it’s also, it’s a conversation. And it’s where we talk to our patients and we find out are there, Expectations realistic. Is this scenario, um, going to be something that we can fix and like I said, about 20 percent of the time we’ll say this is probably not a good, good thing, but we can avoid a lot of problems by being conservative minded and, and I think, um, one of the reasons why Dr.

[00:28:13] Ling and I get along so well is our philosophy is the same. We never are. We never try to forget what we’re trying to accomplish here. We want people to see better. Sometimes it’s better to not do a procedure and, or sometimes people’s expectations aren’t really in line with what we think we’re going to deliver.

[00:28:27] And that might be a time to say, let’s hold off. Um, but I think a lot of the problems, the natural fear people would have, whether it’s a laser treatment or a lens treatment, um, I think being conservative, we can avoid a lot of those things. And if, if a problem arises, That’s all we do is we know how to correct these things as well.

[00:28:44] That’s our area of expertise as well. But I know that’s eyes are important. That’s a sensitive topic. Important topic. Well, I thought, I just want to add a little bit, you know, I joined Dr. Bindi, uh, because we think alike and, and Dr. Bindi has built a tremendous reputation in the Bay Area. For the past, you know, 20, 20, 20 plus years, this practice has been around the Bay Area.

[00:29:08] Um, we are built on our reputation, our current, our conservative approach to vision correction. And also, uh, just our, our techniques and our technology, of course, but really it’s about the trust we build with our community. Absolutely. I thought we’d ask one of our CLR patients to just kind of talk about her experience.

[00:29:30] So welcome, Renee. And what was it like for you? And why did you choose to have CLR? Uh, well, thanks for asking. I’m happy to be here. Um, I chose CLR because, uh, I, you know, when I hit my mid forties, I was no longer able to do my day to day activities, uh, without glasses. And by glasses, I mean, I don’t know, 15 different pair depending on what I was doing.

[00:29:52] And it got to be very, uh, discouraging and life impacting for me. So I know I wasn’t a good candidate for LASIK. I was learning about CLR and thought, I’m going to check this out. And I, I had known Dr. Bindi. I met Dr. Ling and I decided it was the right time. I went from wearing many pairs of glasses for 100 percent of the time to wearing no glasses for almost 100 percent of the time.

[00:30:18] Occasionally, if my eyes are really tired late at night, I’ll throw on some plus one readers. Um, and, you know, just, or I can use a magnifying glass, I suppose, but, uh, significantly improved of my life. I, for a year left my home with prescri get to buy sunglasses rig is very exciting for me a

[00:30:46] That is fabulous. Thank you for, thank you for that. And, and, uh, Dr. Bindi, I want to know, like, how would someone find out if they’re a candidate or not? Well, the first step is find a time to come into the office for our advanced vision analysis. And I’ve touched on this a little bit, but it’s just where we can take a bunch of measurements.

[00:31:04] We can meet with you firsthand and see if it’s appropriate. Um, and then after that, um, also, we have patient counselors who can, um, explain more of the logistics. People have a lot of, um, good questions that are just more, when can they take showers? When can they drive? When can they go to work? And, um, and between our team, we can answer all those questions as well.

[00:31:26] So, and that’s where you can find out, um, if it’s appropriate, and then the patient decides if that’s something that’s going to fit well into their lifestyle. Um, but the first step is doing the consultation with Dr. Ling or myself. Correct. And also a virtual consultation they can have if they’re not ready to come in yet, but want to have some more specific questions answered.

[00:31:43] Uh, we can take care of that. I’m just showing a screen from our website where you can actually go online, uh, and register, or you can call us. You can call us and, and, uh, And we’ll be glad to schedule that for you as well. Um, people have been asking online about cost and insurance. So let me if it’s okay, I’d like to cover those for a moment.

[00:32:02] So the cost of custom lens replacement is 69 75 per eye is considered an elective procedure. It is not covered by insurance. And obviously most people have both eyes done. So it’s just about 14, 000. Now, uh, we do also offer patient financing over 24 months that is interest free. So it’s a much smaller and manageable patient.

[00:32:27] It doesn’t, uh, payment. It doesn’t reduce the cost, but it makes it easier to digest on a monthly basis. And then there are some patients who come in who, when we do the examination, they actually have. a presence of a cataract that is significant enough that, uh, we will work with you. In fact, we have a third party reimbursement specialist.

[00:32:45] We refer patients like that to, to see if their insurance plan would cover some of the costs or perhaps all of the costs of the procedure. Uh, we don’t know that and we don’t have a billing department. We don’t do that directly, but we are happy to connect you with someone. Who will manage this entire process.

[00:33:02] In fact, including interfacing with your insurance company, you would pay us and then you would get reimbursed from them. So we’ve created more options on there for patients to make it more affordable for them. I will say that later on this summer, we will be increasing our fee for custom lens replacement.

[00:33:20] Now, anyone who’s been on this webinar, we know who you are. So if you call us, we’re going to On or whatever the current, the current price is, but going forward that is going to change. Um, but the process of determining candidacy does begin with you getting an exam. And as Dr. Bindi and Dr. Ling said, about 20 percent of the time we are gonna, we’re gonna say no, don’t, it’s not right for you.

[00:33:40] Don’t do, don’t do this now or don’t do this ever because of your individual, uh, condition. Um, I guess, Dr. Bindi, in closing, um, I would just like to ask you, why, why do patients, you’ve been, you’ve been here for many, many years, uh, as the medical director, why do patients choose Laser Eye Center? Why do they, why do they come to us?

[00:34:00] Well, I mean, on a practical level, a lot of the time it’s because they know several people who’ve already been there. So they, they might say, my, my mom had LASIK here 15 years ago, my, My dentist, my babysitter, all these people, it’s, I think a lot of this is really a word of mouth referral, to be honest, where that’s how people have found out about us.

[00:34:17] Um, but I think when people spend time in our office, it’s, it’s very palpable. I mean, we’re, uh, we’re friendly people. Uh, we have a culture that’s, that’s fun. We’re specialized and, um, all we do, we offer conservative, conservative advice about these modern procedures that work. And if it’s a good fit, we can help you out.

[00:34:36] And if it’s not a good fit, uh, we’ll tell you that too. We’re kind of straight shooters. And, uh, we’re, we happen to be blessed that, um, the technology, the procedures, the laser, the lenses, all these things that have evolved over my career. They’re fascinating. They work so well that, uh, Our product is great.

[00:34:55] So I don’t want to take all the credit. We live in good times living in, in, um, we’re blessed with, with great technology and, and I think our staff and our people and our team, um, just further enhances that. Absolutely. And I just I see a few other questions. I liked us to cover. So people asking if there’s a cost for the consultation.

[00:35:13] No, we do not charge for the consultation. It’s several hundreds of dollars worth of tests. You were to add it all up. No, we don’t charge for the consultation. Someone’s asking if we do both eyes at the same time. Yes, as long as it’s, it’s, uh, it’s safe for you to do that. And that’s typically what we do, just as we do with LASIK, both eyes are treated in the same session.

[00:35:33] So you’re not having to come back and. Again, I guess Dr. Lange, would you just kind of contrast how we’re so different from a standard, uh, surgery, ambulatory surgery center or hospital and how they would do things and how we do things differently. So, ambulatory surgery center are, uh, tied to insurance reimbursement and hospital reimbursement.

[00:35:56] And that’s typically not a very patient centered way of, uh, approach to doing procedures because really it’s insurance telling a doctor what they can or cannot do based on a cost constraint analysis. So many people have heard, well, my, you know, my, my grandparents had cataract surgery at a hospital. They would only do one eye at a time.

[00:36:19] And, and what’s the reason for that? You know, studies have been done. That doing bilateral lens replacement procedures or CAG surgery is just as safe, if not even better in terms of patient experience than doing one eye separated by a week or a month. And the reason they still do it these days is because insurance does not want to cover both eyes.

[00:36:41] The doctor or surgeon or the hospital would actually, would not be able to get reimbursed by this insurance company. So, and in some ways you can look at the reason for that a little closer. But in many ways, it might be a form of care rationing to see, well, if that patient get one eye done, perhaps they, they are fine and don’t need to get the second eye done.

[00:37:02] So it’s more, uh, less of say, well, if you want one eye done, then you just get one eye done here with us. But for us, we’ll always make the recommendation to find the, the, the logistical way to do it that’s best for you. So we’re happy to oblige if you want one eye done at a time. Uh, but for most people.

[00:37:21] They would then get both eyes on, so the next time when they wake up, they’re ready to go. They’re functional and ready to enjoy the ability to wake up and see. You know, I think just to add on to that, I think it’s because we’ve made the choice not to do so many other things. We don’t prescribe eyeglasses or sell eyeglasses or contact lenses, and we don’t do routine eye exams and we don’t manage some of the important diseases like retina and glaucoma, and we didn’t do that so we could focus very, very specifically on modern vision correction.

[00:37:53] And, um, Having been able to work with this team now for several years, it’s just it’s a point of pride. And I think, like Dr Bindi said, the, uh, the experience of patients have to say people seem to enjoy working here and we do. We really enjoy what we do. And we enjoy serving patients and helping them to, uh, to be able to see better without glasses and contacts.

[00:38:13] Um, and with that, uh, Uh, there are other questions. We are going to answer them individually because we couldn’t get to them today. Uh, this webinar was recorded and we will be sending each of you a link to this recording that you can share with your family and friends. Uh, we do have another webinar coming up in just about a month, uh, before we take a little summer break, but we are going to be here, uh, I’m sure you’re going to hear from us all the time and whenever and however we can help you.

[00:38:38] We just, uh, encourage you to reach out to us and you’ll be hearing from us as well. So, Dr. Ling, any, any final comments before we, uh, we bid everyone farewell for the day? Uh, hopefully everyone found this information, uh, useful, interesting. And if you’re curious, absolutely, uh, come in for an evaluation. Uh, we have many, uh, refractive consultants that will be able to see you.

[00:39:06] Uh, if it’s not Dr. Mini or myself, I’ll be able to make that recommendation for you. And then we’ll be able to meet at some point along the process, uh, and, and hopefully get you out of glasses or contact lenses. Thank you. Yes. Well, Renee, thank you for sharing your story. Uh, it’s useful for other people to hear, um, something that you’ve gone through if they’re considering.

[00:39:28] And, and Shreef, you said this would take 35 to 45 minutes. We’re 40 minutes in. So I commend you on being prompt and accurate. Well, everyone’s time. So thank you very much, everybody. And again, if your question didn’t get answered live, there were a lot of them that came through. Uh, we got to as many as we could.

[00:39:46] We will be answering them by email. So look for email specific to that question from us over the next few days. All right. Have a wonderful afternoon. And thanks everybody. Thank you.