Amare Stoudemire's Goggles

I'm sure most Vancouver hockey fans still remember quite vividly the injury that Manny Malhotra sustained last season. At that time, I wrote a blog about the possbile consequences of traumatic injuries to the eyes. Corneal abrasions, glaucoma, retinal detachments, cataracts... these are all serious and real possibilities.

While Manny's injury was serious and required multiple surgeries, he was (and we were) very fortunate that he was able to recover vision and return to play.

But its not only hockey players that need to be aware of these types of injuries. Even in sports like basketball, players need to be cautious. And, as Amare Stoudemire will tell you, its not just the ball you need to watch out for

During the pre-season in October 2008, Stoudemire was accidentally poked in the right eye by his teammate Boris Diaw. He temporarily lost vision in that eye and suffered a torn iris. This is something I did not mention in my blog about Manny, but let me tell you now, this is very painful!

After this major scare, Amare swore that he would wear protective eyewear for the rest of his career. He did for a little while, but found the goggles to be annoying so he stopped after a few games.

Call it karma, call it bad luck, I just call it unfortunate... But a few months later, in February 2009, Amare was hit in the same eye again. This time he suffered a detached retina and required surgery. He was out for 8 weeks which meant he had to miss the remainder of the regular season. When he returned, Amare made sure to keep the goggles on.

Here's a video of Amare discussing his injury and the importance of eye health and protective eye wear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-SemX-mzU

Protect your eyes!

Special thanks to Dr. J. Armani.

Like Pulling Teeth

This past weekend I had the wonderful pleasure of attending the American Academy of Optometry's annual conference in Boston. I had the chance to reconnect with a lot of classmates and friends, as well as visit my school and attend lectures at the meeting. One evening, as we were enjoying a night out on the town, a current 4th year student approached me and said "Harbir, you need write a blog about the importance of regular eye exams!". I told him that I'm sure I've mentioned it a few times already. "Yeah, but why is it that people are willing to go the dentist to get their teeth cleaned every 6 months but they refuse to have their eye health checked every 2 years?!" (Yes, he was both inquisitive and exclamatory all at the same time).

This particular discussion has been a long time coming. I talk about it daily with patients, friends, family, and random unsuspecting people walking down the street who I unwittingly coerce into coversation. But, to this day, I have avoided writing about it because I was afraid that I would end up writing a novel, or it would open up a can of worms, or that all the dentists in the world would hate me and I would never be able to recieve adequate oral care (I guess its a good thing I've never had a cavity!). But, with this recent encouragement from the enthusiastic intern, I decided to give it a shot. And I will try to keep it short!

Less 24 hours after being newly inspired, I had the most convient and fortuitous encounter with friend of a friend who just happened to be a dental student. True story. After restraining myself to allow an appropriate amount of time to become acquainted (maybe 30 or 40 seconds), I jumped at the chance to talk about having my teeth examined bi-annually.

Allow me to summarize.

Harbir: Why do dentists have patients come back every 6 months to have their teeth checked?
Dental student: Because we can.

Ok fine, thats not exactly what she said. But, the gist of the story was, dentists have convinced the world that having your teeth scraped with sharp tools and gargling fluoride every six months are absolutely necessary. When, in fact, according to my new acquaintance who now probably hates me, there is no direct correlation between oral hygeine and dental health. Having your teeth cleaned is not the important part. The few minutes at the end of the visit where the dentist pokes and prods around with another sharp instrument, thats the important part. But even that doesn't need to happen every 6 months. Nonetheless, oral care professionals have done an amazing job of convincing people that these regular visits are obligatory.

I'm not mad at them. In fact, I applaud them. I reach out to them and ask them how I can convince my patients to have their eye health examined more frequently.

I know this is a bit crude but honestly, what happens when your teeth fall out? You get new ones. Crowns, or veneers, or dentures. In any case, you can smile and bite and eat again. But what happens when you lose your vision? Nothing. Once its gone, its gone.

But we don't clean or polish. We refract and dilate. Maybe thats not as exciting for patients. Maybe we should start a new division of eye care where we have people come in to have their eye lids cleansed and eye drops instilled every six months. We'll call it ocular hygeine. Maybe then I'll have patients in my chair more regularly so I can check for silent eye diseases like glaucoma that can cause irreversible vision loss in asymptomatic patients. Because convincing people of the latter alone does not seem to be enough.

Note: This blog was not inteded to question the importance of the dental profession. It was just a reference to help outline the importance of regular eye exams.