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astigmatism, we don't use a special lens," says
Mr. Dawes.
The route a given patient chooses isn't conducive to a spur-of-the-moment decision, of
course. As such, among the many factors that
figure into pricing are the considerable
resources the center spends on educating
patients.
"We have 7 patient care counselors who
work with our patients," says Mr. Dawes.
"There's a lot you have to do to educate
patients about these options and what's covered and not covered. It takes a lot of
resources from the practice side, resources
that when all of us were just doing straight
cataract surgery, we didn't really have to
worry about. People came in, you did their
surgery and they went home. This is a much
more complex process."
The difficulty includes having to explain to
many patients that they're going to have to dig
into their own pockets. "The biggest challenge
we face is patients being surprised by the fact
that not all of their cataract surgery is going to
be covered by Medicare," he says. "For the
most part, patients don't understand what
their insurance coverage is, and they're surprised. So how do you educate them? It's a
complex process and it involves everything
from print patient collateral to e-mail educa
