dilation

Since I've been on my own insurance, I've been greatly disappointed with the medical community's ability to do anything.  I think this is partially due to the expectations put out there by medical shows that have a team of medical experts willing to research and explore various sources of ailments to figure out what the patient of the week's diagnosis will be.  Kaiser, on the other hand, has a had a history of saying, "We're not sure and there's no point of testing" but they at used least to give out Vicodin for everything that ails you.

However, today I met a new doctor in a routine eye exam.  I only get this eye exam done every year because it's a requirement if I ever want to get my lasik updated.  This is the one medical appointment that I have every year that I just want to be an in-and-out thing with no fuss and no muss.  Therefore, it stands to reason that it would be the one appointment that I've had at Kaiser in the past several years that took three hours due to complications that the doctor wanted to research.

I'm still not sure what exactly was wrong.  This new doctor was really thorough though and she seemed to enjoy her job.  I was her last patient of the day and she could have easily dismissed what she had found as a non-problem but she seemed to think that I could possibly be a candidate for the early onset of glaucoma so she dilated my eyes.  It made it so I had to squint a lot when I tried to take mass transit back home.  I took the 35 for the first time too.  I felt like the friend in Adventures in Babysitting that got lost in the bus terminal because her glasses were misplaced.

It ended up that the doctor is not sure that there is something wrong and she would like to optic imaging to be sure.  However, my insurance may not cover it so she's going to do some research to figure out how to get it past my insurance.  I don't think that Kaiser has changed.  I think that I just ended up with a good doctor.  While I don't want anything to be wrong with my vision, I am glad that she's taking the time to care.