Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 10, Number 11, 1 November 1999 — Hawaiian laser surgeon brings the world into focus [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Hawaiian laser surgeon brings the world into focus

By Paula Durbln YOU COULD say Carlos Omphroy has an eye for detail. He is one of Hawai'i's most experienced surgeons at correcting decreased vision, often using cutting-edge laser technology. The specialty suits Omphroy to a T, but, for several reasons, it's not what he imagined he would be doing when he finished his pre-med studies at Occidental College back in the early 1970s. "I was going to UCLA medical school to become an orthopedic surgeon because I had been a jock in college," he explained. "I had always been around orthopedists so it seemed reasonable. But when I did my orthopedic rotation, it seemed there had to be a better way to practice medicine. Orthopedics was very mueh like carpentry and not very subtle. Opthamology, at the whole other end of the spectrum, was a very delicate thing, and, I discovered, a very well-rounded speciality." A Jamaican-Hawaiian born in Panama and bihngual in Spanish and English, Omphroy moved to New York when he was 7 and then to California. Although he didn't become a Hawai'i resident until 1984, his mother, from Papakōlea, made sure he knew about his roots. "I'm very close to my Hawaiian background," Omphroy insisted. "We were in Hawahan civic clubs in Panama and we always knew the Hawaiians in our community. In the mid-'60s, I met all my Hawaiian relatives and I got to spend time with Auntie Mary Kawena Pūku'i, a calabash cousin. She talked

for eight hours and it was the most incredible thing I had ever heard. My only regret was I didn't record her because I never saw her again." When Omphroy retumed to Hawai'i to accept a job offer, the United States wasn't even on the laser-eye-surgery map. "The laser was invented in the U.S.," said Omphroy. "The idea to use it on human tissue first occurred to an

ophthalmologist in New York. But the Food and Drug Administration decided to make sure it was safe. So while the Canadians, Colombia's and Italians

could buy lasers like crazy, the Americans had to prove it was not harmful. "The FDA approved the use of the excimer laser, originally designed to make chips for IBM, in 1995, and that's when I got interested. Dr. Tyrie Jenkins and I put together this Laser Eye Institute, the first privately owned laser surgery center, in late 1995, and we started operating in 1996. We are both pretty conservative, so for us to get involved it had to be a pretty darned good procedure. Originally, patients had to be rather strong souls, but onee LASIK (Laser Assisted in Situ Keratomileusis) eame along, there was no more discomfort. People have the surgery and walk out. The next day they wake up and see well enough to drive - that's everyone. So we got inundated and in two and a half years we have done 5,000 cases." Honolulu's Laser Eye Institute, the first in a nationwide corporate franchise arrangement, has 20 locations and more than 100 participating doctors. Omphroy is on staff but his main practice is in Mililani, and he works at another loeation in Honolulu. For the laser procedure, the patient is wide awake while Omphroy, using a blade called a microkeratome, cuts a flap on the eomea by steppirig on a foot pedal. The laser is applied to the tiny surface under the flap whieh is then laid back in plaee to reseal. "It takes seven minutes per eye," said Omphroy, who ean easily perform 40 procedures a day. The charge for this operation is determined by the equipment's $500,000 price tag, the $250 fee payable to the manufacturer every time the laser is

fired up and the cost of upkeep, usually around $80,000 a year. Why do so many willingly shell out $4,100 for an operation not covered by insurance? "They are either tired to death of their glasses or contacts or they are basically blind without their glasses and they just want to be able to walk around," answered Omphroy. "Some want to improve professionally, pilots, for example, or pro-golfers who really want perfect distance vision. For a lot of people it's a huge functional difference. Some who may have been shy and meek wearing thick glasses eome back a week after surgery shoulders back and chest high. It's a confidence factor." Omphroy has shared his expertise in Burma, China and Cuba through ORBIS, an international, privately-fund-ed teaching program conducted in a DC-10 plane parked on the tarmac in airports of developing countries for three weeks. The first-class area is outfitted as an auditorium where 50 loeal physicians sit and observe on closed-cir-cuit television the operations underway in the main cabin whieh is equipped as a fully functional hospital. Hundreds more view the operations from the terminal. The American doctors are all miked to answer questions and simultaneous interpretation is available. Talking about this experience brings out Omphroy's enthusiasm like nothing else. Without seeming to realize it, he becomes an example of all he loves about his Hawaiian heritage. "There are" he said, "many strengths in the Hawaiian culture that we don't want to lose: the consideration and aloha for other people, the attitude about life, the caring and the giving Hawaiians are able to do." ■

"People have the surgery and walk out. The next day they wake up and" see well enough to drive - that's everyone. So we got inundated and in two and a half years we have done 5,000 cases." - Carlos Omphroy

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Omprhoy at work, correcting nearsightedness with laser technology. Vision will improve immediately but Omphroy will monitor the patient for the next year. In some three percent of cases, the patient's improvement might regress a little, but Omphroy ean adjust this with a short follow-up operation at no extra charge.

Omphroy unmasked, with the Laser Eye lnstitute's cutting-edge equipment