Like Forrest Gump tripping into one adventure after another, I feel I have been blessed with an incredibly exciting ophthalmic career. And being guest editor of Ophthalmology Management for this month’s IOL and Surgical Instrumentation issue is another experience I am incredibly grateful to have.

Taking on anything extra in our already busy lives always seems daunting, but all the unexpected things that I learn along the way invariably amaze me. These secondary benefits are priceless, and I encourage you to say yes more.

For example, I was asked to participate at Women In Ophthalmology (WIO) Summer Symposium recently, and my initial thought was I really can’t take off any more time this year. After some thought, I figured out a way to go and miss only a day of work. Embarrassingly, I had not been to a WIO event prior to this meeting despite being a women in ophthalmology for the last 25 years. After a day, I knew I had been missing out on an incredible organization that is unlike anything else I had encountered in my career. Most eye meetings are very high IQ, but WIO was very high EQ, or emotional intelligence. This nurturing women empowering women environment felt very powerful and inspiring.

My younger self would not have recognized the importance of developing EQ, but my middle-age self believes it may be more important than IQ.

AN EVER-INCREASING DEMAND

A common denominator in this month’s issue is the growing demand on ophthalmologists. This is due to the aging of US baby boomers as well as the decreasing number of practicing ophthalmologists.

Having spent so many years of my ophthalmic career in managed care, I have a unique perspective on managing volume as I perform an average of 2,500 cases annually. Traditional ophthalmologists are often shocked to hear that I do not meet most of my surgical patients until the day of surgery in the pre-op bay. Our teamwork approach to patient care is transparent and coordinated, so most of our patients are very comfortable with having the surgeon’s primary responsibility being eye surgery and other doctors doing the pre- and post-op care.

Sahba Fakhra, OD, and Michael Pernula, MD, bring excellent perspectives on some of this team approach, which I believe is the key to our success with managing our practice and could be an excellent model for other practices as we cope with the growing number of patients that will need our surgical services over the next decade. For the surgeon, it is a huge burden off our backs to not “have to” do everything ourselves.

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE

Besides building systems around excellent efficient care, this issue of Ophthalmology Management also includes ways to work smarter with modern technology. Zachary Zavodni, MD, and Kerry Solomon, MD, discuss how they use integrated diagnostics into the surgical suite with the Alcon SMARTCATARACT and Zeiss VERACITY systems, respectively.

Pamela Williams, MD, wrote an excellent article around cataract coaching, which I hope will spark a new side hustle for some of us!

Plus, we feature news and insight about some of the new IOLs available today. This includes the Acufocus IC-8 Apthera and the Lenstec SBL-3 Multifocal, which were both recently approved and are examples of the fantastic options available today.

TECHNOLOGY WILL PULL US THROUGH

My goal as guest editor was to offer tools and ideas to help us manage the growing demand on our specialty through these excellent articles. As ophthalmologists, we are extremely fortunate to have such promising market conditions paired with an exciting pipeline! While the coming tidal wave of patients seems daunting, technology will continue to support our obligation to help our patients see 20/Happy always. OM

Eva Liang, MD, is a board certified ophthalmologist and refractive surgeon as well as the medical director and founder of Center for Sight, Las Vegas, Nev. She specializes in complex anterior segment surgery and serves as principal investigator on multiple clinical trials. She is married to a healthcare executive and a proud mother to three teenage boys. Disclosures: Dr. Liang is a consultant for Allergan, Bausch + Lomb, Glaukos, Ivantis, Johnson & Johnson, Oyster Point, RVL and Sun Pharmaceuticals.