UK Keratoconus Self-Help and Support Association

hi every body
hope noone minds me making a suggestion.

after having read through a large number of members posts , it seems to me that one of the main questions on peoples minds, particularly members who are newly diagnosed is where to go for the best care, and which high street optoms have the experience (though personally i think the hospital KC clinic should be first choice).
would it be possible to compile a list of hospital KC clinics, optoms, high st optoms, private practices and best surgeons and to add this as a site link from the home page.
i appreciate that it would be virtually impossible to contact every practice in the uk, but would it be possible to do it by way of the members posting who their trusted and relied upon optoms

just a thought.

mike

onwards and upwards

Mike

In the members zone, John has established a list of optometrists whommembers have found helpful.

The problem with ophthalmological departments is that not all hospitals are large enough to have a dedicated cornea team.

Large teaching hospitals are most likely to hve a patient base large enough to have ophthalmologists who specialize in diseases of the cornea.

For this reason, I get excellent attention at Glasgow's Gartnavel Hospital, but if I were seen in my local hospital the surgeon would be a competent eye surgeon, dealing with the generality of diseases of the eye, but he would not have developed specialist skills in cornea surgery.

It would not be fair to say that some hospitals will have an annual cornea transplant while others see this surgery carried out weekly, but the exaggeration does highlight a disparity in experience that is a real part of the 'postcode lottery' to which some keratoconics are victim.

My advice would always be to seek a referral to a big centre with a large teaching hospital. When there make sure you are speaking to the consultant who specializes in corneas.

Andrew

Thanks for the suggestion, Mike.

As Andrew says, it's a difficult thing to do with the consultants, but we are in the process of establishing a KC-friendly list of optometrists... in the meantime, you could take a look at the recommendations on the members-only pages.