PEDIATRICS Vol. 70 No. 1 July 1982, pp. 109
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow P3Rs: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when P3Rs are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow E-mail this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My File Cabinet
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via CrossRef
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Search for Related Content

OPHTHALMOLOGISTS' BLIND SPOT

Student

[A blind person has poignantly summarized] his impression of ophthalmologists' attitudes toward patients who are becoming blind: "We are interested in vision but have little interest in blindness."

In one of Shakespeare's most horrifying scenes, Lear's monstrous daughter Regan, having just incited Cornwell into tearing old Gloucester's eyes from their sockets, commands her servants, "Go thrust him out at gates, and let him smell his way to Dover" [King Lear, iii. 7.92-2]....

Assuredly, no ophthalmologist would be anything but appalled at the prospect of bidding a nearly blind patient to "smell his way to Dover." Yet, from what [has been reported] about the paucity of help. . .received from the professionals in coping with blindness, the effect is much the same. . . .

Some years ago my son, a victim of congenital glaucoma, received expert surgical treatment at a major New England medical center, but when he was ready to learn how to see with what vision remained, the response of staff ophthalmologists ranged from bored indifference to crude and insensitive (and unhelpful) improvisation.

Dealing with one of nature's most isolated and self-contained organs, ophthalmologists—perhaps more than their brethren in other specialties—can be forgiven for not seeing "the person for the eyes." One hopes that they will take [these] observations to heart.