One of the five percent.

[JMRmail]

Let me share something about this.

My US cornea surgeon did not tell me any of the risks, nor that he knew I had a very high likelihood of rejecting in two years. It was even doubtful whether a first attempt could be done given that the area directly above my blood supply was so thin, it looked like it would rupture.

However, he did discuss this with Dr. Swanson in Mexico. He also told Swanson he didn't really want to do the surgery because he didn't want the failure in his case load. I had no idea, and I couldn't get my US cornea surgeon to schedule the surgery, and I told this to Dr. Swanson.

Dr. Swanson told me the truth about why my doc didn't want to do the surgery, that he had consulted with him, why his office didn't return my calls, why no one wanted to try the graft or even talk to me. The situation was grim and they were hoping it would rupture on it's own and then it wouldn't be a transplant failure. Someone else would be on call that day and it would be their failure.

Dr. Swanson then asked me if any doctor any time had explained to me what my outcome was likely to be. Every ophthalmologist (probably five in four years) knew this and no one said a word to me. Only one fitter really clued me in on the fact that I wanted to avoid a transplant at all costs, but he didn't tell me why.

I said I hadn't, and Dr. Swanson spent 45 minutes telling that not only was I probably going to lose my bad eye, but that my good eye was going to follow in the next year. Only a miracle was going to save my vision. I was shocked. I don't know why, but for some reason losing my eye was tremendously worse than just being blind.

Dr. Swanson then offered to do the transplant if I still wanted it done. Of course, the C3R and Intacs worked and I didn't need a graft.

I love that man.

A couple of weeks later, I went back to my US cornea surgeon to show him the results. He said that what Swanson had done was "impossible." He stood there looking at my eye and said, "That can't be done, you can't make a cornea thicker." He just kept mumbling over and over again. He insisted I have an Orbscan done on both eyes to compare to the one I had done a few weeks earlier. He stood staring at them, then looking at my eyes and then back and the Orbscans.

He then had the nerve to explain to me all the possible risks of C3R and ask me if I had signed a consent form.

About a month later, I received a bill for the Orbscans.

[rosemary johnson]

Crumbs, JMRmail! What a story.
I hope and trust that you bounced the bill for the orbscans.
Do you not have a Freedom of Information law inthe US that you can use to get hold of medical records? - I think yours might make very interesting reading.
Rosemary

[JMRmail]

I paid the bill. . . only because if something did happen to me, this would likely be the doctor called to do an emergency transplant. He's a bit full of himself.

I have most of my records, they are published on the internet. My story is published here:

http://www.keratoconus-group.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=902