A Load of Floss

You know what I am tired of?

Medical marketing tricks. The kind that we all fall for. The kind for which there seems to be no remedy.

Did you know that you have to get a "fresh" contact lens prescription every year or opticians won't dispense new ones?

This means that in addition to the hundred plus smackers I have to come up with annually (depending on how clumsy I have been), I have to cough up another couple of bills for the 'exam.' Rhymes with 'scam.'

Not only that, but unlike a prescription for glasses, your optometrist hangs on to your contact lens prescription as some sort of 'work product.' This means no comparison shopping for you, my friend. It is a neat, vicious, circle. You want contacts? Better ante up for an exam. Once you have that exam, though, you are stuck with that dispenser and whatever markup they choose to apply. How do they get away with this? They are my eyes, aren't they? I just paid you to service them, didn't I? It is as if you were to take your car in to be serviced and they refused to tell you what was wrong with it.

Apparently I am not alone in questioning these practices, for a cursory search at Google.com reveals that this issue has even been before the United States Supreme Court in Williamson v. Lee Optical Co. (1955). In fact, in California, new legislation has been enacted (AB 2020), effective as of January 1, 2003 to:

"Require optometrists to release contact lens prescriptions to patients following initialing fitting of the lenses...Therefore, there should be no charge for lenses used by an optometrist for an initial fitting of contact lenses."

Interestingly, at my last eye exam, in February of this year, the optometrist and her staff appeared to be unaware that the California state legislature called a, "willful violation of these practices unprofessional conduct."