Like many eye care providers, I started out providing general optometric services to my patients. These included eye exams, glasses, and contact lenses. The main source of income came from vision insurance companies. Since I started my practice from scratch, there weren’t a lot of patients. Most of my patients then found me through vision insurance company directories and Medicaid services. When starting a practice “cold,” you need to have patience for business to pick up and grow over time. In reality, during the first few years in practice, I found that there were many private practices, similar to mine, that were barely making enough to cover their expenses.
I worked at another practice to supplement the income. After a few years, my practice’s revenue steadily increased and I was able to step away from the part-time job at the other practice. However, I noticed vision insurance companies started to cut their reimbursement to all their eye doctors. In addition, online companies selling glasses and soft contacts for significantly less started to pop up every second. Because of these things, my income was slowly declining with each passing year.
Facing the terrible fear of having to close my practice, I searched desperately for a solution. A call from a friend changed my life completely. Her radio guest speaker cancelled last minute. She thought of me and invited me on the talk show. We sat together to talk about different things in our lives on a live talk show. Somehow, the topic of nearsighted children came up. I told her that I helped my nieces control their nearsightedness with a specialty therapy called Ortho-K. To my surprise, when I got back to my practice, ten minutes later, my office was full of children wearing glasses. Parents wanted to have that specialty therapy for their children so desperately. Since that day, 98 percent of my patients are Ortho-K patients! These parents willingly pay out of pocket to save their children’s eyesight. The initial stage of starting my Ortho-K was not without struggle. I had to face my insecurities about if I was the best doctor to provide this specialty care for these children. However, at that time, there weren’t any doctors who offer this service. If I don’t face my fear and insecurities and step forward and offer this healing therapy, who will?
For years, I continued doing my “homework” in the evening, read and re-read all the literature, and reviewed all the class notes on this topic I took in optometry school. I made numerous calls to all the Ortho-K lens designers ensuring that my patients get the best FDA approved lens material and designs. Day by day, my determination and passion grew. I knew that there is no better gift out there that parents can give their child but the gift of sight. I became so motivated to share this “Magic Therapy” that I wrote weekly articles, talked about it on TV shows and radio shows, held workshops and seminars to bring forth awareness of this sight-saving therapy. To this day, I can say that parents in the local area came to know me as the Pioneer Ortho-K Doctor. The years that followed were even more exciting for me.
At optometric continued education conference and conventions, whenever colleagues learned that I helped children with Ortho-K, they wanted to know more. During lunches and dinners with my colleagues, I would always hear them asking me about “How do you do this?” and “How do you do that?” regarding Ortho-K therapy. Through many follow-up conversations via text messages and phones calls, I have been able to help my colleagues build their own successful Ortho-K practices. The goal of writing this book is to share my journey in building a specialty Ortho-K practice to even more eye care professionals.
Chapter 3:
The Successful Blueprint
“Order and simplification are the first steps toward the mastery of a subject.”
– Thomas Mann
Amazingly, it has been over a decade since I started my Ortho-K specialty practice. Since then so many changes have happened that I could hardly believe it. The majority of insurance companies were dropped. Our office consists of mainly Ortho-K patients; about 98 percent. I work about nine to sixteen hours per week. This leaves me with a lot of quality time to spend with my family. This is all possible due to the Successful Blueprint that I have created and perfected over the years. The realization that you already have the knowledge to start the journey of change toward Ortho-K specialty will be a huge step toward success.
Seven highly effective strategies will be detailed in a step by step process in the following chapters. Each of the following seven chapters will discuss the different but vital topics that will help you build a prosperous Ortho-K specialty practice. Chapter 4 discusses about the fact that you need to face the truth about the source of the eye doctor’s problems. Then, solutions will be discussed to help eliminate insurance patients and focus more on quality patients rather than quantity through a high-class concierge service that shows your passion for myopic children. You will gain the skills to become known as the Ortho-K Guru. In Chapter 5, you will come to realize the power of your professional skill that you can offer to save so many youngsters’ eyesight. If not you, then, who will step forward to provide such a critical sight-saving care? Once you focus on the benefits for these myopic children, your professional career will take on a new and much more meaningful experience. Be prepared to be passionate about your career again!
In Chapter 6, you will gain the confidence in delivering to parents the message that they yearn to hear; giving them hope and providing them with life-changing solutions. You will learn and share the useful tips and prevention to preserve the health of their eyes. In Chapter 7, you will learn the most effective ways to show your patients how action can speak louder through personal involvement with Ortho-K treatment by using the Ortho-K lens yourself. In Chapter 8, highly effective ways will be discussed on how to become known as the Ortho-K Guru in your area. In Chapter 9, the action starts! We will go step by step into how to implement the Blueprint in your newfound specialty practice. In Chapter 10, I am very excited to give you the secret on how to generate year after year “residual” income from Ortho-K patients you have successfully helped. In Chapter 11, we need to recognize the possible obstacles and learn ways to overcome them. In Chapter 12, we have completed our master blueprint plan; however, it does not end here. An exciting and fruitful journey has just begun. I am so excited to share my life’s work with you and hope that you will have an amazing profitable and stress-free life as I have enjoyed for over a decade!
Chapter 4:
The Source of Eye Doctors’ Problem
“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit at home and think about it. Go out and get busy.”
– Dale Carnegie
Eliminate Insurance Plans
This is the question that represents the source of eye doctors’ main concerns: How can we decrease our dependency on insurance companies for income? When I started my private practice, I was accepting all the insurance companies I could get my hands on. When a patient calls us to make an appointment, my staff had to check all the insurance companies to see which one they fall under, and then get