San Jose eye doctor gives ‘Gift of Sight’ to local HOPE Services
clients
Charlie McIntire said he hates to wear his glasses, but he needs
them for the detailed machines on which he works at Charles River
Labs. He is often forgetting his glasses or avoids wearing them.
But in October, Hollister resident McIntire will undergo Lasik
surgery to repair his eyesight through the
”
Gift of Sight
”
program.
San Jose eye doctor gives ‘Gift of Sight’ to local HOPE Services clients
Charlie McIntire said he hates to wear his glasses, but he needs them for the detailed machines on which he works at Charles River Labs. He is often forgetting his glasses or avoids wearing them. But in October, Hollister resident McIntire will undergo Lasik surgery to repair his eyesight through the “Gift of Sight” program.
Michael Furlong, an eye doctor in San Jose who owns Furlong Vision Correction, has been running the program since 2002 and selects 10 people a year to receive the surgery. For the last five years, he has partnered with HOPE Services, a nonprofit which offers job placement, vocational training and independent living services to adults living with disabilities throughout the Bay Area. McIntire uses the supportive employment services.
“He absolutely hates wearing his glasses,” said Anita Haag, the coordinator for supportive employment and independent living services. “He needs them for up-close work and the work that he does where we have placed him is a lot of up-close work and working with machines.”
McIntire is farsighted and he is looking forward to “not ever having to wear glasses,” Haag said. “He hates wearing glasses and he forgets to wear them a lot of the time. He has to take them on and off to go back and forth.”
Susan Bell, the director of human resources for HOPE, explained that wearing glasses can be difficult for HOPE clients for many reasons.
“It’s not just that they may lose their glasses,” Bell said. “Many times they don’t know how to care for the glasses. Looking through them they may be very foggy or clouded, and the expense of replacing glasses may be prohibitive so they may not be able to replace them.”
She said clients in wheelchairs have their hands constantly touching the wheels of their chair so when they touch their glasses it becomes an issue.
“I have not met anyone yet who hasn’t been totally transformed by the procedure,” Bell said, of the surgery that is available for clients as well as staff members who meet the criteria for procedure. “Even though they thought it would be nice not to wear glasses or contacts they all responded with amazement at the quality of their vision and the life change that it brought.”
Haag, who had the surgery on Sept. 9, said that the change in her vision was immediate. She said she could see details that she hadn’t seen for years. She first needed glasses for farsightedness when she was 15 and has had to wear them for the last 30 years. She never tried contacts because she has allergies and doesn’t like the idea of something in her eyes. She said that she stopped wearing her glasses 15 years ago. Her eyesight had declined over the last few years.
“My eyesight has declined and it was seriously impacting my work,” she said, of her coordinator duties at the Gilroy office. “I had to put my glasses on for everything and it started to be something that was a big deal.”
She said she was terrified of the procedure, but she talked with coworkers and clients who had already gone through the surgery.
“That morning, I was nervous and I thought about backing out … but my experience (was good) and now looking back I had nothing to be afraid of.”
The recovery has been easy, and she said her eyesight has continued to improve since the surgery. She said she didn’t have any pain or discomfort as long as she used the eye drops from Furlong’s office every hour, as prescribed.
One of the Gilroy clients to undergo the surgery, Fraisure Sumpter, also had an immediate response. Sumpter uses the supportive employment services and works at North Coast Medical in Gilroy. Haag’s daughter is his job coach and she shared with Haag how Sumpter said he felt since the surgery.
Sumpter had been wearing glasses since he was a child and had very thick lenses that he squinted through.
“He said immediately he had more self-confidence,” Haag said. “It is very important to him to put forth a good image.”
She said Sumpter did not like wearing his glasses and often had to be reminded to wear them.
“He actually wanted laser surgery – he’s a very informed young man – but there was no way he could have afforded it,” Haag said. “He did say Dr. Furlong was excellent with him and he was very comfortable … His walk is already a little more confident.”
Furlong said he thought about the “Gift of Sight” program when he was completing his training 15 years ago. He said there were programs that offered no-cost cataract surgery to people with no insurance, but there were no programs that were offering Lasik surgery free of charge. He wanted to start a program working with “deserving nonprofits.”
For the first few years he worked with different agencies such as the Make a Wish Foundation, the American Diabetes Association and the American Cancer Society.
“For the last five years we’ve latched onto this one charity because of the people that are involved and the benefits,” Furlong said.
Furlong said the criteria to be a candidate for the “Gift of Sight” program include a need for glasses that the patient or client will not or cannot wear, sometimes because of the physical thickness of the glasses, and they have to have a condition that can be corrected with surgery. The surgery can repair farsightedness, nearsightedness and astigmatism.
Each year, his office invites candidates from HOPE, including clients and staff members, to come in for a complete eye examine at no cost to see if the surgery is an option for them. They then use a lottery system to select 10 candidates for surgery.
“We give preference to clients if we can,” he said. “In years past, we’ve had two to five clients themselves …With any leftover (slots,) we do a lottery for the HOPE Services staff.”
The surgery typically costs between $5,000 and $6,000. Furlong’s office has been able to get vendors to donate supplies, while his office donates the time. The procedure is considered elective, so most health insurances do not cover it. The pharmaceutical company with which Furlong works donates the eye drops and he explained that the laser company works on a royalty system so that they pay a fee every time they use it. Abbott Medical Optics Inc. donates the key cards needed to run the laser.
“Every year our staff looks forward to putting this program together,” Furlong said. “It’s a lot of work but a lot of fun work. It’s very rewarding.”
