Why Do You Have More Than One Eye Doctor?

By John Choi, MD

Many times patients ask why they need to see another eye doctor since their retina specialist is taking care of them. This is a good question. Why put up with the time and expense of seeing two eye doctors?

There are actually many kinds of eye doctors. Although the eye is small, it is incredibly complicated. So complicated that it’s impossible for a single doctor to know everything about it. Eye doctors have divided this huge pie of eye knowledge into smaller, more manageable slices known as specialties. Think of the eye as a house – it needs an electrician, a plumber, a heating/cooling technician, etc. Each specializes in managing a different aspect of the house. Same with eye doctors caring for the eye.

A retina specialist manages diseases of the retina, which is the lining of the inside of the eyeball containing the vision machinery such as rods and cones. Macular degeneration, floaters, and retinal detachments are some of the problems they treat. They manage only retinal disease. They don’t prescribe glasses, and don’t treat other eye diseases such as cataract. Retina specialists leave those issues to the primary eye doctor and the other eye specialists since they are more knowledgeable about those conditions.

Having multiple eye doctors can be burdensome. But having each eye condition managed by the most-knowledgeable doctor leads to the highest quality of care for that most precious resource, eyesight.