Patient raves (instead of rants)

[optigrrl]

I love the fact that I can look to this forum to co-miserate about problem patient but I would like to take a moment to talk about my more positive experiences in this industry...

Today I had an elderly patient call me personally to let me know that she passed her drivers license exam with her new glasses. She was crying.

A patient overheard that it was my birthday when I was dispensing her glasses and came in the next day with a birthday card.

One of my opticians successfully switched and engineer from a ft 35 to a progressive - and he thanked her! (Trust me when I tell you she has the patience of a saint)

So sick of hearing the ole' excuse: "I just opened up the case and the glasses were just like this...!" I told a patient I would fix everything, no questions asked if she told me the truth about what happened...AND SHE DID!

I'm sure there are some incredibly heart-warming stories out there to remind us why we do the things we do - especially those of you lucky enough to work with children.

[shellrob]

It's so much easier to complain about the bad patients instead of raving about the great ones. Thanks for starting this thread.

I'll never forget all the gifts and cards I got from my patients after I had my daughter 2 years ago. I was shocked and touched that they would all think of me.

[ziggy]

I've had so many great patients over the years, but being from the south people tend to say thankyou with food. When I started in the field I had just gotten out of the US Army and was a stelthy 185lbs 15+ years later I'm at 250 and still growing!! Sitting on my butt 10 hours a day has not helped but I still just love it when they bring you jam,cookies, cake etc. for just doing my job.

[GOS_Queen]

Once when our crew stayed late to help a long haul trucker who had lost one lens while loading his truck and on his way out of town ... he thanked us with 100 #'s of freshly picked, HUGE onions ... (they were heavenly) (this is what he was hauling btw)


and nothing will be more precious than my little friend (3 yrs old) who came (with her mother) to the store during the holidays to "thank me" for all the adjustments with a small box of See's candys.

[chip anderson]

Nice gesture but he was probabaly giving you someone elses product (the shipper). This is like one of your employees furnishing some of your product to his friends at no charge (translation: stealing).

Chip

[shellrob]

Go away negative Chip........this is a positive subject.

[Karlen McLean]

In over 20 years of dispensing, I'll always remember all the homemade cookies and cakes and candy, and treats...some patients even brought us take-out meals when we were extremely busy.

Practicing in South Florida, we received a lot of seafood. There was a shrimp boat captain that brought in oodles of shrimp because he loved his corrosion-resistant metal frames. Then there was the boxed set of Chilean wine...

We received Christmas and Hanukkah cards drawn by charming children...I still have one portrait of me with wearing giant glasses by a 5-year old that's so precious.

Many patients cut comics related to eyecare and eyewear from newspapers and magazines to bring in to us. Several of our patients were very giving. You didn't dare say you liked something they owned like a handmade eyeglass case or mention a book by a certain author...you'd end up being given the eyeglass case and a copy of the book.

One baby we helped, all of about 6 months with conjenital catarats...I think about a -30.00D OU didn't say a word when we put on his first pair of glasses. But he looked startled, then blinked, then looked around, then smiled at his mother and I. Priceless.

Working with low vision patients was mostly a hard go, but some patients we were able to help with (expensive then) low vision devices were so grateful! Comments like, "You've given me back my life!" combined with happy tears were the best gift of all.

[Dave Nelson]

Karlen, you will never believe what a coincindence this is, but I work fundraising for a charitable organisation whoses mission is to supply SHRIMP and CHILEAN WINE to those who need it (or want it) most. If you could pass some of that gererosity on, please send all the shrimp and wine you can to: the Dave Nelson Foundation...;)

[harry a saake]

the best gifts were from the mountain folks up in north georgia, they brought in vegetables by the bushel basket, along with apples, but the best was all the white lightning, i could have been drunk 6 days a week, but i used to give it all to my mother-in-law, she drank it all and lived to 86.

[Johns]

You didn't dare say you liked something they owned like a handmade eyeglass case or mention a book by a certain author...you'd end up being given the eyeglass case and a copy of the book.

Nobody told me...

I complimented a sharp dressed elderly man (87 year old)on his belt last year, and two weeks later he stopped in with it -gift wrapped for me ! We took him out to lunch as a thank you, and we all had a great time. (I complimented him on his Mercedes also, but so far...;) )

[mlm]

I adjusted a pair of glasses for a patient last week. It wasn't even a major thing, unlike some mangled up jobs I've worked on... Two days ago, she came in with a beautiful bouquet of peonies to thank all of us for the work we do. :)

I also got flowers from a contact lens rep last week, but that was an apology for no showing on an appointment she had with me.

[Karenrp1956]

We fitted a three year old with his first pair of glasses, -8.50s. He spent the next 5 minutes staring at his mother. All got teary eyed in the office.


I had a gentleman say he would be back in a few minutes, just kidding I said "Bring us back something" He brought back 8 pts of Blue Bell Ice Cream.

Just a funny: Our offices use to be divided with a hall between the doctors side and the optical. Two doors going outside. One day I have this young man come in the office (about 7). He was an African American. He asked me if I could help him find is mother, I said no problem and started walking around the offices, he looked up at me and said "She's black". I would have never found her if he had not told me that. I said "thank you for telling me"

[fvc2020]

I love this thread:D


Just Thursday, one of our patient brought in flowers for the office. She is a post op lasik patient. Since Sunday she had some blurring in her left eye. We got her in, dialated, ran a visual field, got her into her surgeon. We found no pathogy(either did they). We just reassured her. They told her it was dry pockets??? She also sent a note with the flowers that said Thank you for the wonderful care she had received in the past few years, and that she always looked forward to coming here.
Sometimes its the little things we do that makes everything we do worth while..;)

christina