For the rest of the week, I have bounced around and followed different ophthalmic technicians and doctors. Ms. Barrow was occasionally busy with her job as manager, and she wanted me to get experience working in different specialties of ophthalmology. On Wednesday, I followed Dr. Shah, who specializes in the cornea (the outer membrane of the eye). The patients I saw with him were much different than Dr. Nussdorf’s glaucoma patients. None of them had glaucoma, and he saw adult patients of all ages. One patient came in with a pretty severe eye infection. (To the people who wear contacts: DO NOT SLEEP IN THEM! You can get a very bad infection and potentially lose some of your vision!) Dr. Shah numbed his eye in order to take samples to test for gram-positive bacteria, gram-negative bacteria, and funguses. I had no idea that you could take eye samples by directly using a tiny blade on someone’s eyeball, but apparently the patient didn’t feel a thing!
Some of Dr. Shah’s other patients were follow-up appointments from some of his surgeries. He does twenty cataract surgeries every Monday (WOW) and also does cornea transplants and some other surgeries on the outer eyeball. He used a laser to touch up one patient’s cataract surgery and checked to make sure that another’s cornea transplant was healing seamlessly with the original tissue. A second-year ophthalmology resident was also shadowing Dr. Shah that day, and she helped me set up the slit lamp in order to observe how the patient’s eye was healing, which was very cool!
On Thursday, I followed two different ophthalmic technicians, Sonya and Aris, who work with Dr. Eustis, a pediatric ophthalmologist (who also happens to be my doctor as well!). This day was very fun because of the adorable patients! Dr. Eustis sees children of all ages, from newborns to late teens and often does surgeries to correct strabismus (“wandering eyes” or lack of muscle/nerve control in the eye). I had a particularly good time making funny faces with a little four-year-old boy, who thought he was tricking his mom by sticking his tongue out at me. He was my favorite patient so far! After a while, Aris taught me how to use the remote that controls the electronic eye chart, and for the last four or five patients, she let me do their basic eye exams, which was a fun experience.
On Friday, I followed a technician, Fran, who works with Dr. Nussdorf. Most of the patients were there for follow-up appointments because he does surgeries on Thursdays. She also let me look at some patients’ eyes through the slit lamp and showed me the types of devices Dr. Nussdorf can implant in glaucoma patients’ eyes to help improve their conditions.
I really enjoyed following different technicians and doctors because it allowed me to see different patients of all ages and conditions! I look forward to what I will experience next week. Hopefully, I can shadow someone who works with retina patients, as that is one of the only specialties I haven’t observed yet, and actually is the specialty I am most interested in as a career.
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