Guest Post by John Stossel
I just got new glasses — without going to an optometrist.
It’s another innovation made possible by the internet.
Going to an optometrist can be a pain. You have to leave work, get to an optometrist’s office, sit in a waiting room and then pay an average of $95 (in my town). But I got a prescription for just $50 — without leaving my computer.
This is possible thanks to a company called Opternative (“optometry alternative”). The company claims its online test is just as good as an in-person eye exam.
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I was skeptical. It’s over the internet! How can a computer replicate what optometrists do in their offices with impressive-looking machines?
“This is the beauty of technology,” answered Dick Carpenter, director of strategic research for the libertarian law firm the Institute for Justice.
Carpenter researched Opternative’s test and concludes that it is just as good as an in-person exam. “Sometimes better, some research has indicated.”
Here’s how it works: First, you answer some medical questions.
Then, while holding your cellphone, you follow prompts on the phone while looking at your computer screen, selecting which lines look sharper, or which numbers you see.
One day later, they send you a prescription. Mine exactly matched the prescription I got from my ophthalmologist, a medical doctor who charges much more.
Fast, cheap, and easy.
So naturally, optometrists want this alternative banned. “This is really foolhardy and really dangerous,” said former American Optometric Association president Andrea Thau on “Good Morning America.”
I assume they knew I’d mock them for trying to ban the competition. Which they are trying to do. They wrote the FDA that the at-home test “should be taken off the market.”
What they’re really saying is that patients should not have the right to make any choices in their own vision care.
The optometrists are bottleneckers. “Bottleneckers: Gaming the Government for Power and Private Profit” is the title of Dick Carpenter’s new book. He studies how established professionals use government to limit competition.
Cosmetologists get laws passed that force hair-braiders to spend $5,000 on useless courses and tests. Restaurants limit food trucks. Established florists ban newcomers. Optometrists want to ban Opternative’s test.
Bottleneckers like them have clout in legislatures because their lobbyists give politicians money. They persuaded 13 states to draft bills that would ban at-home tests.
In South Carolina, then-Governor Nikki Haley vetoed the ban, correctly calling it anti-competitive. But the legislators were beholden to the optometrists’ lobby; they overrode her veto.
The optometrists say that a home test is too risky because no doctor is there to look for diseases. I confronted Opternative’s spokesman about that. He said the test’s questionnaire filters out sick people by asking questions like: “Any health conditions? … pregnancy, nursing, diabetes … Any medication that affects your vision? … Sertraline, Amitriptyline…?”
Obviously, a questionnaire is not as good as a doctor. But it does screen out some people. Opternative rejected me the first time I tried. I then lied about my age to test their service.
I don’t recommend lying on medical forms. But a cheap internet prescription is not much of a threat to public health.
Barbers claim an unlicensed barber might give you a bad haircut or cut you.
Florists say an unlicensed flower arranger might spoil your wedding.
The optometrists at least have a better argument: The at-home eye test might miss a disease.
But I say we consumers should get to choose what risks we take.
I choose to go to an ophthalmologist because I can afford it, and at my age, I want a glaucoma test.
But many young people don’t want to spend that money. And many people just don’t have time. That’s probably why lots of Americans never go to any eye doctor, ever. Opternative at least gives them an alternative — a way to get a prescription without going to a doctor.
It’s good to have a choice.
I never heard of this and I’m due for a new scrip-I’ll try it out-thanks!
I was talking with my optometrist recently. She told me that the “annual eye exam” for adults under 45 is just marketing from the companies that sell glasses.
She said your eyes stop growing at 20, and don’t start changing again until 45.
I looked at all my prescriptions for the last 20 years that I’ve saved. They’re almost identical.
I go to an ophthalmologist. I believe an eye exam – looking at your retina and eye pressure is one medical exam that is worth while.
OK fools. This can’t be John Stossel..well not the “John Stossel”. Even he, a monumental moron, wouldn’t fall for something as stupid as this. You are free to do anything you want with your money. If you want to take an eye test on a computer you most certainly can but I suggest that you give that money to TBP rather than waste it on useless and meaningless tests that pretend to be eye tests. Eyes just don’t work that way and even the real John Stossel would know that.
I have worn contacts for decades. It used to be that if one was lost, you just ordered a replacement. Then, in CA at least, if it had been two years or more since your last optometrist check, a new law decreed that you must have an exam before doc could order your replacement lens.
That wasn’t good enough. Now the time frame has been reduced to one year.
Fortunately, doc must give you a copy of prescription so you can go around him to get contacts.
I want to support my friendly local optometrist, but I can’t afford his prices anymore. Vision insurance, which I used to have, was almost useless. So off I go to the guy at Costco, who will sell me my contacts at about half the price. That phone app probably will get outlawed. Everything is a hustle.
I have a friend that has a C-PAC machine. He tells me you need a prescription to get a new one!
Not only that.. just a couple of years ago you used to be able to buy the CPAP **supplies** (the mask.. the nose and/or mouthpiece) *without* a script. No longer!!
DH not having bought one in a couple of years, I was shocked to find that you now need a prescription for those as well, when they are just pieces of plastic which you might want to swap out to try new versions as they develop (pillow types, silicone types, flat types, etc.).
It’s outrageous. Also, iirc, I came across “recommendations” that you buy a new mask every two months!! These are $80 items!! New tubing every week! ..something ridiculous like that.. I might envision this type of changeover in a germ-ridden hospital ICU or something, but in a regular household it is an absurdity. It’s just to guarantee manufacturers a bloated stream of consumption and waste upon which someone can profit.
Since my DH got his machine in Italy, they won’t service it here. To get a new one he would have to start the entire sleep-study process over again from scratch, rather than them just programming in the existing settings.. I’m assuming multi-thousands on top of the $1k machine that we’d have to pay out of pocket seeing as we have the Romney-bamacare.
Tell your friend if they need a new mask, to try the bestcpapprice site. I came across an option there whereby you could order a mask “parts kit”, which (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) contained the headgear and mask just as you would normally get, except you didn’t need a scrip for it.
Everything is a racket these days.
I can barely think of a non-racket enterprise.
If you need new lenses use Replacement Lense Express. Their replacement lenses cost 70% less than the national optic retailers.
John Stossel is an annoyingly smug dickhead, but on this he’s right.
Coincidentally, I started looking into this site about a week ago:
My eyesight has been “bad” since 4th grade, me always having been a typical nerdy reader and non-athlete, but it’s getting to the point of diminishing returns, where I tell the optometrist my vision issues, and they give me sharper-focus glasses, and all the whiz-bang anti-glare coating and thin lenses, but my eyes *feel* worse. I sorta see better, but not really.
This guy, Steiner, is super-slick, but there is definitely truth behind his pitch. I’m on the fence about his program, and will need to watch some of his videos before deciding to sign on. What’s nagging me is my eye doc’s concern that my retina is on the verge of detachment. If I can really reduce that risk by training my eye back towards a more normal shape, that would be a good thing.
If you go to EyeBuyDirect, though, you can order any glasses you like, no app or Rx needed. I just ordered a reduced-strength pair for close up and intermediate vision; frames $30 (they had some as low as $7), lenses $20. Compare to $100+ for frames and $200+ for lenses that I usually drop at the local joint. Also on the EyeBuyDirect site, you can upload a photo of yourself and virtually try on the frames.
I had begged my eye doc for two prescriptions: one near and one far, but he insisted on progressive bifocals and I really dislike them. I hope this pair will help me around the house. I’ll let you all know when I get them how they are.
The idea that the brain is as much of a factor in vision as the eye/lens is, I believe, also true. As my current “progressive” bifocal prescription makes my vision “iffy” anywhere out of the very center of the lens, and as I have to goggle my head around to view things “normally”.. I feel as though it is having an effect on my mood (worsening it), and on my inspiration to do housecleaning or even work on fun projects, because “looking around at things” just isn’t pleasant or normal any more, but instead a chore. Though my prescription is something like -4.5/-7, I find myself just taking my glasses off completely for relief.
I have seen three different opthalmologists over the past 12 years or so, in two different countries, and they were all the same/on the same page.
I have progressive lens -they are great. Just give yourself a couple of days.
Also once you have them make sure you get the same progressive lens manufacturer when getting a new prescription.
I have a strong prescription (SPH) with astigmatism (CYL and Axis) in both eyes. About 5 years ago I got a new prescription and the Dr recommended progressive lenses. I ended up with a $400 pair of glasses that I could not stand. At least I went to one of those places that you could take them back within a month if you didn’t like them and get your money back. After that I went online to get separate pairs of glasses for each use and a pair of lined bifocals for when I was doing something where it was too awkward to switch pairs. There are plenty of places online that sell glasses for reasonable prices and you just supply whatever prescription that you want. Two that I’ve tried with good success are 39dollarglasses and Zenni Optical. Zenni Optical is a bit cheaper. You might have to play around a little with the DX to get exactly what you want for each pair except for the distance/driving pair with your “real” prescription, but the glasses are cheap enough that you can try many pairs for the $400 I paid for the initial pair. Following what the Dr did for my “computer” prescription I just subtract the same number from both SPH to get a pair of glasses for a specific need. For example, my distance prescription is OD Right: SPH -5.00, CYL xx, Axis yy; OD Left: SPH -4.25, CYL zz, Axis qq. The pair of glasses I’m wearing right now to work on the laptop are OD Right: SPH -3.75, CYL xx, Axis yy; OD Left: SPH -3.00, CYL zz, Axis qq. So I subtracted 1.25 from the SPH numbers and left the others the same. For the desktop computer, since it sits a foot or so further back I use the prescription -4.25, -3.5, which subtracts .75 from the SPH numbers. The only other thing you need to order online is the pd – the distance between your pupils. Sometimes this is on your prescription. You can also do a search online for methods of measuring this yourself.
I dunno about getting a prescription over the internet, tho. But since I don’t have a smartphone it looks like this one wouldn’t work for me anyway.
That’s pretty much what the endmyopia guy recommended: subtract (well, for nearsightedness, add) a fixed amount from both diopters. I also checked first for overcorrection on my existing pair, and adjusted for that.
His method of measuring your ‘correct’ diopter is pretty simple: just check the number of cm at which your focus just turns blurry with each eye. You really don’t need fancy gear or an app for that part, just a tape measure and a bit of text that you can adhere to the opening edge of the case.
The measurements I got were just under my prescription strength, so I can vouch that this method is legit for measuring degrees of nearsightedness.
I would still go to an opthalmologist every few years to check on organic aspects of eye health.. this is more like fitting a prosthesis to your liking, I’d say.
I traveled to Japan last year and ran across a company at the Ueno train station called “Jins” eyeware.
They will make you a pair of glasses on the spot, with an exam in 30 minutes or less for around 8,500 Yen (around $85) while you wait.
The exam is done with a computerized machine that measures your eyes with lasers in about three mintues.
Jins has expaned to the USA wth three locations– San Fran-Freako, San Fernando Valley and another location close to the Santa Anita Race Track. The only difference with the Japanese outlets and the American outlets is that they cannot use their computerized eye measuring machine here in the USA–you have to bring a prescription.
When I go back to Japan next week, I am going to get another pair of glasses from them.
Bifocal lenses takes a few day longer to make–and they are made in Tokyo in their labs there using superior grade lenses from Howa… which are then shipped here by air carrier and fitted to you frames.
Jins makes their own frames and are not part of the monopoly frame company that own most of the major brands and which overcharges.
Ueno Station. Brings back memories of my dad and me getting off the train for the 60 yen (one sixth of a dollar at the time) bowls of udon served on the platform 50 years ago. Quickly eaten, the bowl returned to the cook and a quick dunk of the bowl in a tepid basin of water and ready for the next customer.
The reason health care costs so much. Simple.
Has anyone that has had Lasik surgery used this online examination process and can/will you comment on its success/failure for you?
Thx in advance…..
Hey..chubby bubbles…..my Costco optometrist put me in 2 different contact lens many years ago…..right eye is 2.45….for reading….left eye is 4.75 for distance…no need for bifocals!!!!
When I moved to reno a few yrs ago….the Costco optometrist tried his best to get me away from that….he finally relented….
Your the boss….tell them what you want or go pound sand….
Good luck
Thanks. I’ve seen that option discussed before, but it sounded wierd to me. Glad you like it.. it does show the degree to which the brain can be plastic in responding.
I’m not new to progressive lenses.. had them for maybe 8 years or so? I’m on my 3rd or 4th pair, and while they no longer make me nauseous, it’s the lack of peripheral vision that is increasingly wearing me down.
I tried contacts but my eyes are very dry, and I don’t like the idea of having something on my eye surface all the time. Glasses are just so easy to throw on and off.
I’m the boss? Uh.. I guess. Rather than make a scene, though, I’d rather just not go back and find an alternative. As I said, I got the same types of glasses prescribed by all three of the doctors I visited. I always asked about having 2 pairs and they always insisted that wouldn’t be as good as the progressives. They could have sold 2 pairs instead of one, so I’m not sure why they were so adamant…
So now we see the truth of John Stossel. He PRETENDS to be a libertarian and a believer in freedom of choice and markets but ONLY when HE personally benefits from freedom. I have watched this ass hat on numerous occasions in which he BLASTED any of a number of FREE CHOICE alternatives in the marketplace because he said there was no science behind them, etc. HE is just a shill for big government. In this case, freedom applies to him so he is ok with it. Don’t be deceived into thinking this wolf in sheep’s clothing has changed his tune. He has NO INTEREST in promoting REAL freedom for anyone if it upsets HIS personal agenda.
I can’t wait until my optometrist opens a new shop and just sets up a bunch of smartphones with these apps. Why have a silly low tech phoropter (at ~$3500 a pop) when you can use a small handheld computer to do the SAME thing! (wrong) Then, instead of having ~100+ years of borne out science and knowledge used to study the tissue of my eye, I want my doctor to just put his hand out and bless me through the same fancy computer. (wrong again) Then, when I finally have defeated my own health by trying to circumvent the people that are trying to screw me into taking care of myself (wrong yet again), I want to refer myself to the exact doctor that will fix me up lickety split on the spot and make it as if nothing had ever happened. I’m gonna take care of myself if it kills me or makes me go blind….STUPID!!!
“~100+ years of borne out science and knowledge” > Huh.< Would that be the "science and knowledge" that has led us to statins and Vioxx®™? To nuclear power with no solution for the toxic waste? To GMOs and Round-up®™ in breast milk?
Nobody's going to go blind from wearing slightly weaker glasses.
The larger point is taking responsibility for one's own health when it is not outside of one's capabilities to do so, and getting out from under a racketeering mechanism which is sucking everybody dry: a drop here, a drop there..
Many people will lose eyesight from not visiting with their eyecare professional about the health side of vision. Let’s make this a third world country as far as eyecare and see how far that gets us. You want “slightly weaker” glasses? Go to the people that do that for a living…talk with your everyday hometown optometrist about the idea and get the whole scoop. If you undercut your distance RX it will be blurry out there… next time you go to the optometrist tell them how blurry you want it…seriously. That will give them a good laugh. “better 1 or 2?” “Well, I want 1 because it is blurrier, and that is what I’m after because I’m an imbecile that wants to do this myself. I also have a do it myself attitude about everything and I want to make my glasses in my garage after I get home. Then when I die from being too independent to live in your world, I want to bury myself by myself.”
I wasn’t going to reply to this because there’s so much wrong with it I didn’t want to take the time. I also figured you were just young and ignorant instead of flat out stupid. But somebody hit a thumbs up on this, so there’s at least two of you idiots out there.
Not going to the “eyecare professional” every year will cause you to lose your sight. First, most people go to Optometrists (eyecare professionals), not Opthalmologists (eye doctors), so they pretty much just get the standard myopia eye test (very little to do with testing things that could cause you to go blind) anyway. It’s like saying that because you go to one of those oil change places (a “car care professional”) you don’t have to worry about the rest of your car breaking down. Even those people who go to Opthalmologists don’t get all of the medical tests unless they ask for them. E.g. the diabetic eye exam is one that you have to ask for and pay extra. And to top it all off, who’s to say that going every year will substantially increase your odds of not going blind over going every few years or only going when you sense there is something wrong? I’d have to see the data, but given how many blind people I currently know (zero), I’d say the odds are not very significant. Nobody here (except for you) is saying that the doctors and exams should not be available for those who want or need them, just that they may not want them in some situations.
Just because the current nearsightedness therapy (correction) is popular doesn’t mean that it is the only way to care for nearsightedness and doesn’t mean that there couldn’t be problems with it. “Everything is a business model” (George Ure). Over the years I’ve noticed that they tend to “overcorrect” my eyes to better than 20/20. Then when I go back in a year or two my sight with the glasses is about 20/20 but they overcorrect again, so I get a new prescription. Why? The offices not only make money doing the exam every year they make a lot of money selling glasses. They won’t sell as many glasses if they don’t change your prescription. One hypothesis of nearsightedness is that when you overcorrect the eyes they strain to go back to normal sight (20/20) so what you’re doing by overcorrecting is training the eyes to get worse over time. So slightly undercorrecting the eyes when you don’t need long distance vision could cause the eyes to work to correct themselves and get better instead of worse. Interesting hypothesis and it doesn’t cost more than an extra pair of glasses to try it out.
Most of us here were not talking about wanting weaker glasses so that it would be “blurry out there” anyway. The conversation was about the difference between progressive lenses or multiple pairs of glasses at various strengths. When you hit about 50 or so, whether you wear glasses or not, your eyes change and cannot focus as well for shorter distances. If you already wear glasses you cannot just buy a pair of those readers at the drugstore. Progressives are the “in” thing and I think they get a better markup, so that’s what the “eyecare professionals” are pushing. The way that progressives work is that there is a large area on top with the distance prescription and a smaller area on the bottom that changes smoothly from your distance prescription to your reading prescription. The hypothesis is that 1) you don’t have the bifocal line on your glasses so you don’t look old and 2) you can focus on anything at any distance, not just near and far. The reality is that regardless of what you’re looking at there are large areas of your field of vision that are out of focus for what you’re looking at and except for distance the area where you see anything in focus is exceptionally small and you have to keep tilting your head to try to get it in focus. When trying to read with the progressives I could literally get only about half a line of text in focus at a time. So I would have to move my head back and forth and up and down to read each line instead of moving my eyes across the page. Massive neck and head pain! By figuring out what the various prescriptions are for me for reading a book, working on a laptop, etc. I was able to buy a pair of glasses for each use (i.e. each focal length) and I swap them back and forth. Yes, the distance is blurry if I get up and go outside with my reading glasses on, but while I’m reading I see the full page in focus.
Suppose you have a stomach issue. You see a doctor and he gives you Something. It works fine. But two years later issues reappear. He gives you a stronger Something. It works fine. But two years later issues reappear. He gives you a still stronger Something. This goes on indefinitely and you never question this treatment plan … in fact, your doctor convinced you that this-is-your-life. Why would you continue seeing this stomach doctor?
Now, change stomach doctor to eye doctor and that’s exactly what you get!
I’m certainly not saying there’s never a legitimate need for them!
I just hate their solutions ….. ALWAYS eye glasses. I smell a rat. It’s like other body part doctors always prescribing a pill, and never looking at underlying causes or alternative treatments.
Fact. Around 40 years old I needed glasses, badly. Sure, I got the prescriptions and wore them. But, it royally pissed me off. So, I did basic research. I found foods which were best for eye health, and ate them. I researched eye exercises and did them. Within two years I didn’t need glasses!
Will this work for everyone? Of course not. But still … How many times has YOUR eye doc explored those avenues with you? I’m guessing … Never. And that’s a damn shame, for you.