THE PRACTICE: James P. Gills, M.D., established St. Luke's Cataract & Laser Institute in 1968. St. Luke's mission statement is "Excellence . . . with love."

LOCATIONS: St. Luke's main office is in Tarpon Springs, Fla. In addition, six satellite offices are located throughout Florida, in Tampa, Zephyrhills, Celebration, Spring Hill, Bayonet Point and St. Petersburg.

James P. Gills, M.D., was the 1996 winner of the American Society of Cataract & Refractive Surgery's Innovator's Award.

PRACTICE SUMMARY: Dr. Gills is director of St. Luke's, which employs 350 healthcare professionals, including 21 ophthalmologists and 8 optometrists.

St. Luke's offers comprehensive eye care, specializing in cataract surgery, refractive surgery, cornea, retina, glaucoma and oculoplastics. The main office in Tarpon Springs is a 78,000-square-foot facility that houses a 26,000-square-foot ambulatory surgery center. The center has six operating rooms and a 12-bed recovery room.

Dr. Gills says, "We've equipped all of the operating rooms with ultraviolet lights, which are activated when the rooms aren't in use. These lights reduce the risk of bacteria."

SURGICAL FOCUS: Dr. Gills performs cataract surgery exclusively. He has been doing so since 1974, when he limited his practice to cataracts and intraocular lens (IOL) implants.

Dr. Gills did this despite initial resistance from mainstream ophthalmology and the Food and Drug Administration. He explains, "It was the notion of taking care of my patients, not building a practice, that was, and is, my focal point."

One way Dr. Gills takes care of his patients is by religiously filtering irrigating solutions. "I believe it once saved my practice when I received a contaminated batch of saline solution," he says. "Colleagues who had the same contaminated solution had several cases of endophthalmitis. I had none."

Also, Dr. Gills checks eye pressure within a half-hour after surgery. "We do this to ensure that the incision is tightly sealed and the pressure is normal. A tightly sealed incision reduces the risk of infection. Plus, if the pressure is too high or low, we can treat it right away -- before the patient goes home."

PREFERRED INSTRUMENTS: Leica surgical microscope, Surgical Design phaco machine, Varitronics 360š fixation ring, Lieberman wire speculum, Stevens tenotomy scissors, Westcott scissors, McPhearson forceps, Meyerhoefer chalazion curette, Masket capsulorhexis forceps, 45š single-edge diamond blade (for paracentesis), Jaffe lens spatula, Colibri forceps and Thorton IOL forceps. Dr. Gills prefers 2.75-mm diamond blades for making the incision.

PREFERRED MEDICATIONS: Neosyne-phrine 10%, Cyclopentolate 1%, Marcaine 0.75%, Ciloxan 0.3%, Voltaren 0.1%, Intraocular Xylocaine 1% (preservative-free without epinephrine), Pred Forte and Ocuflox 0.3%.

GROWTH AREAS: Dr. Gills has experienced a 10% increase in cataract surgery volume each year for the past 30 years. However, he's seen a 10 to 15% decrease in net income over the past 10 years, which he attributes to managed care.

MANAGEMENT PHILOSOPHY: "At St. Luke's, we're caregivers first, doctors second. We take pride in caregiving and see it as our primary function.

"Part of being a caregiver means treating cataract surgery as refractive surgery, to give patients the best quality vision without the need for correction. It's value-added service.

"It includes procedures, such as relaxing incisions, and exchanging lenses when they're the slightest bit off -- doing extras that other doctors might not do."