I stepped into the clean atmosphere and it felt like I was in a different dimension. Like the cool Sci-fi books and movies, I was the main character ready to go on a journey to a different planet where I can meet the hero that I look up to: Dr. Daniel Kim.
Dr. Kim greeted me with a bright smile that gave out a reflection of hope and tranquility. I can almost guarantee that his patients will feel relaxed once they see his serene smile. It was his office that gave me a feeling of comfort, the clean walls and floors that surrounded me expressed purity, and the small amount of time we had for the interview that kept my adrenaline rushing with interest and curiosity. Dr. Kim was generous enough to give me a chance to spend some time with him for this interview even though he was scheduled for another meeting at the time. Everything went by in a blink, but the interview we had was an upcoming movie yet to be seen.
I first asked him the most commonly asked question to set up an essay-like format with a strong introduction, few body paragraphs, and a conclusion. I asked:
Out of all the areas in medicine, why did you decide to become an ophthalmologist and could you tell us some of the experiences you had during this process?
“I am a third-generation doctor in my family,” he said, “My maternal grandfather studied internal medicine and became an internist, and my mom was a specialist in obstetrics and gynecology, so when I was growing up I didn’t know anything else except being a doctor. I never got exposed to any other field areas or professions. For that reason, I wouldn’t think about anything else.”
Dr. Kim also told me about his interest in science when he was in med school. He said there were five major fields that he could choose and try during the third year of medical school. They consist of internal medicine, general surgery, pediatrics, psychiatry, and then obstetrics and gynecology.
He stated, “I didn’t like any of them.” I found this a little funny because I immediately found all of them interesting - contrary to what Dr. Kim said.
“The first part of the fourth year - which is the last year in medical school - you get to try out different sub specialty areas. The first area - or elective - that I chose was ophthalmology, which I had no clue on what it was and what to expect. Then, I did a rotation for about a month and I was just fascinated with the fact that in ophthalmology, as soon as you do a full exam of a patient who comes in with a problem - over 90% of the time - you will know why the patient is having symptoms. From there, you can make the diagnosis.”
I thought that was the most interesting fact about ophthalmology but certainly not the only one that caught my attention during this interview. There was more to learn and more to hear with my ears wide open.
“A lot of the symptoms are treatable.” Right away, this shocked me too. The fact that patients who are suffering every day because of some kind of problem in their eyes, may have a high chance of getting it treated.
He continued, “In ophthalmology, the practice is both office based and surgery based. That was one of the aspects that I loved. The first aspect was seeing the patient, making the diagnosis with a high percentage of certainty, and treating the disease. The second aspect is like I said, again, part office-based and part operation room-based. The third aspect is that in ophthalmology, it is highly technology-driven so you get to play around with a lot of ‘toys.’ Lasers, Optical Imaging, and Diagnostic tools, were things that I fell in love with.”
I guess some doctors relieve their stress in different ways; the three types of technology he listed sounded complex to me but definitely sounded like toys to Dr. Kim. He started to talk more in detail about the different types of eye surgery, mostly focusing on the cataract surgery since it was his specialty within ophthalmology. He claimed that most of the time, the number one reason for blindness in the world is cataract.
Moving on to more information about his profession and his involvements, Dr. Kim stated, “Getting to know ophthalmology is not an easy route. You pretty much have to be the top in class and I was fortunate enough to get into the ophthalmology residency program. Once I built my practice, I wanted to give things back to the community. For the past seven years, I have been involved with an organization called Vision Care. It is a non-profit organization and what we do is go to underdeveloped countries and provide cataract surgery. Having that skill to do cataract surgery, was definitely another confirmation that I felt.”
It was amazing at the same time slightly sad to know and compare the amount of doctors who get involved in these great non-profit organizations to those who don’t care at all. Dr. Kim was one of the (about) 38% of doctors who were involved in such organizations to help others in need.
He also added, “With cataract surgery, it takes probably about 10-15 minutes of surgery and in that duration, you can restore vision to those who have been struggling with poor vision. I have learned that it’s not just the patient who is suffering, but the people around them can feel the same pain twice as much. This involvement is definitely a rewarding experience and now we are providing free cataract surgery to those who cannot afford enough money in the local communities at New York and New Jersey for the first time starting from last year with the help of Vision Care.”
He was not only a doctor who helps and treats people with poor eye vision, but a sincere and compassionate human-being with enough empathy to provide free cataract surgery to those who can’t afford money.
The clean and peaceful office of St. Mary Eye Surgery at New Jersey
My first “body paragraph” started out with a question that a lot of people, especially teenagers, were curious and concerned about. I started to tell Dr. Kim about the trouble of technology and the environment around us and how it could affect the human body with a leading result of poor eye vision. I also told him how teenagers are stressing over the use of both glasses and contact lenses as they can cause a conflict or discomfort. Not only do these teenagers get worried, but their parents become concerned as well. I - personally - have not dealt with any eye problems but the subject gave me a sense of curiosity and concern too. For that reason, I decided to ask him some of the most common and recent questions asked by people and teenagers who are dealing with this type of situation:
At what age is the Lasik surgery allowed or recommended? Could you tell us if it would be too dangerous and risky to take the Lasik surgery at a young age and how much of a difference/change it would make?
He responded, “Lasik surgery is a very, very safe and effective surgery to reduce or eliminate the prescription that you need to see at your best. The primary condition is that your prescription should not be changing too much. Just like how your height can change year by year, your eyeball may continue to grow or elongate. That’s why people who are nearsighted has a change in their prescription. The FDA put a limit of age 18. Even when you reach age 18, your prescription changes significantly every year and then obviously, you have to wait a little bit. But anybody age 18 or over whose prescription has been stabilized, can get the lasik surgery done.”
It was interesting to hear about the things that other people were curious with even though their curiosity was different compared to mine. I appreciated how detailed and caring Dr. Kim was as he answered the questions.
The third question I asked connected with my second question except this time, it was a question concerning with the effects of the environment instead of technology. In the summer, as we all know, a lot of people wear sunglasses without even realizing or knowing why those sunglasses are strongly required. They only notice and feel the pain when the sun reflects their eyes which is one of their reasons to wearing sunglasses. This topic caught my attention and I was pretty curious about this one specifically since it goes out to everyone, not only those who have poor eye vision. I asked:
As an ophthalmologist, can you tell us if wearing sunglasses is really necessary and if so, why/how do they protect our eyes and provide safety?
With bright eyes of knowledge, he said, “In the sunlight, there is a harmful spectrum of light. As you go from red to violet, anything in the blue-violet ray, is harmful to not just the eyes, but the skin and so forth. That’s why people put sun protective lotion, or sun block, on their skin to prevent sun damage from UVA and UVB.”
If only someone told this to me when I was at the age of seven - I would’ve listened to my mom so my skin wouldn’t have been burnt in that hot sunny day when I went swimming without applying any type of lotion.
“The same concept goes with the eyes; by wearing sunglasses, you’re protecting the eyes from the harmful parts of the sunlight - usually, the blue spectrum of light. This creates sun damage on your white part of the eye called conjunctiva and you could start having these fiber vascular growths called pterygium. When you see a patient or people in general who come from countries near the equator, most of them start developing pterygium. It’s a latin term for fiber vascular tissue and it is shaped like a wing. That’s purely from solar damage. Going inside the eye, we talk about cataracts. People who has been exposed to a lot of sunlight, start developing cataracts much sooner than the average age. Going further behind the lens where the cataracts occur in the retina, you could develop a disease called Macular degeneration, which means you lose the healthy tissue. The retina cells, which are the neurons - the nerve tissues, works like a film inside a camera. They start to become damaged from the sunlight.”
The initial reason why I became interested in cameras and photography/film was because it functioned like the human eye. It had very similar parts that combined and worked all together to take an image or snapshot of the moment, scan it, and save it as a memory. I was getting more and more interested in the human eyes and ophthalmology as our talk lasted longer.
Letting out a small smile, he continued, “When you are young, you cannot think about these harmful effects, but these are all cumulative effects. When you get exposed to a lot of sunlight at a young age, it’s all additive. As you get older, you tend to age faster and wrinkle faster the same way it would react if the sunlight exposes your skin. Your eye will have solar damage which could cause your eye to age faster. Therefore, it is definitely a good idea to wear sunglasses with UV protection to prevent sun damage inside the eye.”
Along with his answers, I asked him if the same problem will happen if our eyes get exposed to the light from lamps or ceilings when we stare at them for a long time. He stated,
“The ceiling light doesn’t have the UV light so it is perfectly fine. However, our cell phones and computers has the blue spectrum of light too so they cause the same amount of harm as the exposure to sunlight does.”
Right away, I thought about the technology that I use often - some every day - and how it might cause severe or serious damage to my eyes. This instantly worried me.
November, 2015
Dr. Kim and his wife bought my artwork
To wrap up the interview in a essay-like format, I concluded with the question:
Are there really any ways that could make poor eye vision become better? Is there anything else in the environment that could cause harm to our eyes that a lot of people don’t realize?
He responded, “Well, it’s always true that healthy diet will keep every parts of the body healthier. Green vegetables and anything healthy in your diet will keep your eyes healthy. Carrots, as you know, has a lot of Vitamin A and Vitamin A is an essential ingredient for the health of your retinal cells. It’s not just carrots, but a well-balanced diet is probably the best way to go. Just like every parts of the body, when your eyes feel tired, it’s sending a signal by ‘complaining’ that it’s time to rest. When that happens, walk away from the computer and take a 5-10 break. When you work near, your eye muscles are working that much harder to focus. Allow the eye muscles to recharge so that you can engage in your studying again.”
I always questioned why my eyes were slowly closing by itself sometimes when I wanted to focus in school. The few minute break never came by but after hearing what Dr. Kim said, I think it’s time for me to give some respect to my eyes and accept its complaint.
“Nothing is going to make your eyesight better though, because usually half of the reason why you wear glasses is in your genes. But it’s always the environment factor that affects eyesight too. If you could control the environmental factors and stop doing such horrible things that can damage your body like smoking, and instead having a healthy diet and exercising, your eyes will definitely be healthy.”
“One thing I could also tell you is that as you get older, there are a lot of dry eye patients. Dry eyes obviously comes with aging since you tend to lose an amount of production that you’re secreting. However, the dry eye problem can be avoided by applying contact lenses with a good habit which will keep your eyes healthier and less dry.”
It was all so interesting and fascinating to hear the different types of eye problems and its causes. Even though Dr. Kim had a meeting at the time of the interview, he was kind and sincere enough to spare some time with me for this interview and answer my questions. Within the terminology Dr. Kim used, I learned a lot about ophthalmology which gave me another chance to look into the different fields of medicine.
This journey was not only like a Sci-fi movie, but a documentary of Dr. Kim’s life as an ophthalmologist and his lesson to all of us.
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