Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
this is a talk I developed
several years ago
when I held a chair at the University of Houston
and later also elaborated it to present it at the University of
Indiana
two institutions with which I was attached personally
and I have given it every year
at each of these institutions to the freshmen entering class because
I think it is information that
student should be aware of
and possibly even many other practitioners
what most of us don't realize
when we think of optometry
is that we exist
for a specific reason
that was because ophthalmology was stupid
when Helmholtz,
Tscherning and the rest of the greatest
physicists
Ophthalmologists of
Germany
first began to describe
how we really operated
our visual apparatus really operated
and the rolled that refraction played in it
most of ophthalmology ignored it deliberately
the idea that
fitting a lens had any place in ophthalmology was ridiculed
one of the ophthalmologists of the time
made the statement that I'm quoting
to contend
that headaches
and eye strain
can be remedied by a convex lens
is utterly stupid when we have morphine available
Siskin,
one of the few ophthalmologist of that period
who actually
specialized in refraction wrote he said we were considered quacks
we were ridiculed
we were kept from joining
our fellows
he said my father
he says I could never personally for example
ever have become a physician
because of my high hyperopia
if I had not been corrected
with the appropriate convex lenses
by a traveling spec fitter
but my father who was also an ophthalmologist
warned me to my dying day that I was ruining my eyes
and that legend of lenses
interfering, harming
the eyes
carried on
and maybe still does but it certainly carried on to my early years in
optometry
because I remember many of my patients saying
wearing glasses will weaken my eyes won't it
and even today's sometimes
I think some of the optometrist hear that from people
result was of course that
spectacles were fitted by spectacle fitters by
arbitrary individuals
many of them from opticianry who handled spectacles and frames
and as
some of you don't know
and may have wondered
became the tenant
of the
jewelry industry
and why
well, we know or it's claimed that surgery came from the barber shops because they have
the sharp instruments
and optometry came from the jewelry stores because the early patients
were more worried
about the
real value and validity
of gold spectacles, gold frames than they were of the lenses
and jewelers were of course the handlers of gold frames and that's what there was
and so optometry first started out with jewelers
and actually the first articles on refraction
in this country
were published
and the jeweler's manual
and the first jeweler's manual
carried these articles and eventually changed its name
to the review of optometry
so, for the early years up into almost a nineteen hundreds
the refractive
elements of ocular care rested
what ophthalmologists would call laymen
now that didn't mean that ophthalmologist weren't aware
there were ophthalmologists that were aware for example Gould
who is editor of the
ophthalmology journal
wrote editorial after editorial bemoaning the fact
ophthalmologists were allowing all these laymen to get into the field
and it wasn't until several years went by
that he finally wrote an editorial where he said I have to be honest and I have to admit that these
laymen do a better job than my fellow
ophthalmologist do
but, here was what was
important and that ophthalmology ignored
in about a
latter year
Irv Bennett was running
his big
clinical
show
he got some figures together and on the dollar proportion of what went on in the
eye field
and for that year
he said there were about nineteen billion dollar spent in the eye field
altogether
and of the nineteen billion dollars it broke down about like this
about two-and-a-half billion
in eye examinations by both
ophthalmologists and optometrists
about two-and-a-half billion
went into it
cataract surgery
and its correction
about one billion ran into the cure of ophthalmic disease
so six out of the nineteen billion
were covered
the balance of the nineteen billion
were in spectacles and contact lens
and ophthalmology
began to suffer
from the change that began to take place
in these fitting
and handling
of cataract surgery
when I was a young man cataract surgery meant you waited for the cataract to be
ripe
that meant the patient's vision changed every
little while
so they had to come back and get a new pair of glasses while we're waiting for it
to get ripe
and so the average cataract patient meant about six refractions to me
six pairs of glasses
and to the ophthalmologists that were also doing it
now eventually they were ripe and you could get them out
and then what happened
the whole
problem of
cataract surgery
many of you don't know
you younger people wouldn't know
when a patient had cataracts taken out in those days and that he waited for that
cataract to become ripe, hard, firm, solid
opaque practically
they had to open the cornea widely in order to get that whole darn thing out
and that created quite a problem of healing
and cataract patients were put to bed with bricks on each side so they
wouldn't move their heads
for a week or so
because they're worried that the
cornea would not heal
properly
and suddenly what happened
you've were able to remove a cataract before it was ripe
when it was still fluid or liquid
with a suction device that went through a tiny hole in the cornea and you no longer
needed the bricks, you no longer needed all the hospitalization
you could suck it out
and you put a little plastic, bent up plastic lens in
filled up with fluid
and took the place of the lens
and cataract surgery changed
you no longer had six refractions coming to you before they did the surgery
you can do it at any stage
and that cut down the number of refractions of both optometrists
an ophthalmologists were getting
and never have thought of it
and the result was
Ophthalmologists suddenly as even optometrists realized that they were
losing part of the refraction business
and since this became
such a simple device, methodology
good businessmen in ophthalmology
became the experts, they built huge clinical setups
They took over most of the cataract surgery
and it got the point where it was estimated that
about eighty percent of the cataract surgery being done right from twenty five to
thirty percent of the ophthalmologists
and that's true today
well what do you got left if you don't do refraction
you have a billion dollars
of eye disease
and some examination
and ophthalmologists began to realize that they'd made a bad mistake ignoring refraction
and they started out
to get it back
and when I began
in optometry
I began, I became an optometrist
only a very few years after the last state passed its optometry law
You know the first state was Minnesota in nineteen-one
and why because in eighteen ninety five
Prentice
Charles Prentice was the son of one of the leading dispensers in New York
was sent to Germany by his father to really learn about
optics
and to learn about dispensing
and Charles Prentice came home in his father's office
and at that time ophthalmologists were beginning to refract
start to begin the worry about it
and they would give patients a prescription to take to these dispensers
and Albert Noyes
who was the leading ophthalmologists of New York used Charles Prentice's fathers firm
for dispensing
now I don't know if you know this
I'm sure you know it but you never thought of it
but I don't think any of you have ever heard the story
that a surgeon
whom patients died
came out
and said to the family I'm very sorry we made a bad mistake on this one
never been done
surgeon always comes out, and what does he say the patient didn't make it
so when the pair of spectacles didn't work
what did the ophthalmologist say to his patient
I messed up your refraction, nooo
optician didn't make it right
and then he would do it over
call the optician and try
The young Prentice
probably at that stage probably knew more about refraction and the
optics of how to deal with this dispensing everything, probably anybody else in
America
and he got fed up with this because who had to pay for the new lenses
the optician
So he got fed up with it and opened up a refracting lane in his dispensing shop
and when the patient came in with the slip from the ophthalmologist he put
the patient in the refracting lane and did it over again
and that's what he gave the patient
didn't charge anything, the patient didn’t know
they weren't paying anything extra, nothing was involved
and if the patient, if he broke a lens, he come back to Prentice anyhow
and Noyes knew this and so many of the ophthalmologists and other opticians
Prentice’s friends began to do the same thing
but as long as it was hushed up, nobody paid attention
and then one day Prentice thought, why am I doing this for nothing
and he said to the patient there’s a charge for this
now that was a different story
patient already paid the ophthalmologist
if he had to go pay the optician too
that was something else
and when that happened
and a charge was being made for that
Noyes charge Prentice with practicing medicine without a license
as long as he hadn’t charged it wasn't
do you see
and several other of the leading opticians got involved
and we got the first
a break
and instance
for the beginning of the real optometry
and the word optometry was beginning to be used anyhow
Lendl had first used some years before
and they started to try to get it, but there was no real association or group of a
optometrist during
until past nineteen hundred
although the word
time began
well early nineteen hundred
these optometrists began organizing and when they found they were accused
of practicing without a license
they said we better get licenses
so they started trying to legalize
what they were doing
and remember the charge, you’re practicing medicine without a license
so they forbid the use of drugs in optometry
and the outcry that came out
a lens is not a pill, do you see
and that's how we got started and that's why we have the ban on
the use of drugs
which you had to, to get the license as I said, Minnesota was the first state
one of the other north central states was the second state
and about ten years into the Nineteenth, the next century
we began to have about eight or ten states that were licensed
but the last state was only get its license only a few years
before I actually became an optometrist myself
now when they became optometrist
what happened
the first teaching institutions in optometry
were pressured
instituted
by the optical shops that were making glasses
for example Bill Needles
in Kansas City
was backed by the Merry Company who later which became one of the founders of
American Optical Company by joining with other companies
and the Merry Company would sell the idea
to people to learn how to use a trial case which they would
sell'em
and how to become practitioners
and Needles gave a course, and eventually built the Needles institute and gave a one year
course
and they got a certificate
and that was education in optometry
do you see
well that wasn't the only education, there were other institutions and there was an
institution in Chicago run by the McFatrich brothers
and the McFatrich brothers
were physicians
and they established a school in a downtown building in Chicago called the Northern
Illinois College
of ophthalmology and otolaryngology and they didn’t teach much ophthalmology
or very much otolaryngology, they taught refraction
mostly, do you see
and they were doing fairly well
and then one day somehow they
themselves
discovered something, they discovered an eye ointment
and they called it Murine
and it became the most widely used eye ointment in America
so widely used they decide to what the heck are they running a school for
they don’t need it
Murine was the biggest thing they could sell
about that time, optometry, the state boards were examining optometrists
for licensure, those that had past it
and those that were beginning to try to pass laws
and they did it an interesting way
they gave this man who took the course a diploma
indicated he had passed, he was a qualified optometrist licensed optometrist
and they used the word optometry
but across it in diagonal letter
they framed hollow letters that you could read through
by exemption
or by examination
now remember most optometrist were in jewelry stores
and they put these diplomas in their windows to assure the public that they
were qualified
but if I was on this side of the street
and I have a diploma
by exemption
and you were on the other side of street you had a diploma by examination
I felt I couldn't compete well
so the states went to Bill Needles and others like him
and ask him could you give them an educational course
so they could take the state board and get a slip that said by examination
and Needles told me because he was the head of the Northern Illinois college
and that's where I went
and I was their first all A student so they decided I ought to be a member of
the faculty
and
I became associated with college
and I became eventually Bill Needles’ protégée
he liked me
my own father had died of tuberculosis at the age of forty two
and Needles was sort of a father figure with me
and he
pushed me and took me with him and everywhere he when he took me with him
every meeting
and he told me the history that went on before me
so I knew of a lot of things that have gone on
that most optometrists never knew because nobody was there like Needles to tell
them all stories about it, do you see
and what happened was
these people came, hundreds, thousands of people, optometrists came to Needles
and others
to get courses so they could this license by examination
qualify
and Needles said I made enough money
so I could go to Chicago
and buy the Northern Illinois college from the McFatrich brothers
he took it to the south side Chicago changed it to the Northern Illinois
College of Optometry and that's where I went to school, do you see
and he brought people like Charles Shepard not many of you don’t know him but he's the one
who actually develop the
binocular, the uh...
stereoscopic
devices that were being used in all optometry
he was an individual a little like Will Rogers
talked like um...
and talked that kinda way
no real education, what a genius
became one of the best educators in optometry
and he worked for the Needles Institute in Kansas City
and when Needles bought the Illinois college he brought Carl Shepard to Chicago
when I became a member of the faculty I became a friend of Carl Shepards
got to know him and work with him
and so on
and what happened then was
we started moving
the man in a, we had
three universities schools
Ohio State
California
and Columbia
Ohio State and California were state schools
Columbia was a private institution
when Columbia needed money you had to raise that privately, optometry could never
afford it
they never could raise enough money
the other two were state schools we could always go to the legislature
put pressure
and we lost Columbia eventually
luckily we didn't lose Columbia until we had formed this new school in Indiana
because George Giles was a friend also an author of a textbook from England
was here at the time and said oh boy
aren’t you luck that you got Indiana when they lost Columbia
he said it would look very bad
but let me tell you something that was true about optometry, nobody knew what it was
the woman I married never heard of it
well what is optometry
many people I met, optometry, are you a real doctor
nobody knew
we were all, you saw optometric signs in jewelry stores and stuff like
this, do you see
but nobody knew much about it
and ophthalmology had realized that made a bad mistake ignoring refraction and it was now out
to try to get it back
and ophthalmology pressured
and they pressured their dispensing opticians
to, papers in my day were full be sure to see a medical
eye specialist
and signs were shown
and finally
guess what
reader's digest came out with a beautiful new issue
about two years after I became an optometrist
in which the front cover of Reader's Digest
had big heady sign
optometry
the new quackery
and it was really tough to be an optometrist
Bob Tubesing and I were together as pals and we wanted to practice together
we couldn't
get a building downtown Chicago to rent two us
because the ophthalmologists put the pressures on
the opticians put the pressures on
it was a very difficult time for us
and ophthalmology was determined they were gonna get it back
and then to cap everything else optometry got very
powerfully feeling
and wrote a resolution
out on the west coast meeting
refraction is the practice of optometry
that spring the ophthalmologists met in Atlantic City
and passed a resolution
no member of the section on ophthalmology of the American Medical
Association can be a friend of
cooperate with
refer to
accept, work
or any kind of compatriot
activity
of professional status
with an optometrist
and that lasted twenty some years
and it was a handicap to the man in a small community
if the ophthalmologist in his town wouldn't cooperate with him, you see
and so we were getting into real trouble because ophthalmology had missed the boat
it was amazing
you know what saved us
contact lenses
ophthalmology didn't know what a contact lens was
optometry jumped with both feet into because most of the developers were
optometrists
and we got into contact lenses
and when I got in, I got immediately into contact lenses because I realized that
was the salvation
and it was our salvation
kept us going, kept us competing
to a great extent
well, we finally got rid of the resolution we finally, you know how
there was a student whose name I don't remember
in the Northern Illinois college, a little fella
never paid much attention to him
I remember only that he was there when I saw his name
he graduated
never joined the AOA
never joined the state association
nobody ever heard of them
and he was practicing I guess somewhere in Illinois
and the years went by
and all of a sudden one day he picked up the phone
called
the secretary of the American Medical Association
and said your association, one of your sections
has resolution in effect
preventing its members from cooperating with optometry
and I am going to sue
the medical association for restraint of trade
secretary of the medical association called the secretary of the section of ophthalmology
get rid of that resolution
and that's how we got rid of it would you believe it, and none of us ever saw this guy
we didn't even know what happened
You know, we don't know how it happened, you see
well time began to go on
the war came along
and when war came along
it began to interfere with most of our private colleges
cause universities could get by
except for Columbia
but the private colleges began to lose students right and left because optometrists were not
held back as physicians
and they were drafted and the army and the military had no
commissions in the military, but
they're losing a lot of physicians to the military and people start hollering
we're losing doctors all over
so the government passed a rule that health professions
could borrow enough money
or get enough money
on grants from the United States government, to help
expand
their departments for turning out more health professionals
and that's how most of the optometry schools began to build new buildings
they all came in there, they were included
got money
we built a new building for Indiana, we built a new building for Pennsylvania
we built a building
everywhere
and that's how we began to do it, you see
but we were still facing this
public question, when I was in Houston
the ophthalmologist got together and hired Bob Hope
and they put a picture of Bob Hope on every lamp post in Houston
be sure to see a medical eye specialist
the printed little statements
which they handed to their patients remember an ophthalmologist can everything
an optometrist can do and more
and we began to hurt
and we tried to hirer
Bernays who was the father of
of the public relations
and had been the public relations guy who had
convinced
John D Rockefeller to give everybody a dime, so he could create good feelings instead of being
the oil baron
who was cheating widows of their oil, do you see
he was the first guy, he starts public relations they hire him to give a speech and
Needles took me to it
and
Bernays got up and he said
let me explain something to you
if an impartial agency
were to say a Cadillac is the best automobile in the world
that's public relations
if general motors says it, that's just advertising
he says we practice, how do we
practice
the opinion motors of a community
are the people
that people listen to, they listen to the banker, you listen to the lawyer, listen to
the doctor
listen to people in
and in eminent position
those are the public relations people
the janitor is not
nobody listens to the janitor
he says but most of those people are graduates of major universities
they've all been fellows of fellow
societies
fraternities together, they know each other, they work together in same
campuses
since we don't, you don't have that situation in optometry
and he says I cannot help you
and I went back from that meeting terribly depressed
and I said there's only one thing we can do, we must
start working
on building a system
that parallels the other professions and Charles Sheer
said to me
at one time
Irv, you're never gonna make it
until you win the respect
of your peers
and so we realized, I start preaching, we start working hard
on the idea that we had to build up
our whole system, our education system
our institutions and all
and a level that could be respected
now at that time there was no accreditation of schools
that was qualified
the state boards had
a committee
but state board members are politically appointed whether he knows anything
about education or not
we don't know
and we had state board members would come visiting our colleges in
Northern Illinois
and we paid for their visit
and there was one guy from Nebraska who had to be in New York fairly often
and whenever he had to be in New York he'd stop in Chicago and investigated
the school
which the school paid for his travel
and going home he went through southern college and have them pay for this
and I'd watched him in at work and I thought this guy doesn't know what he's
doing, doesn't know anything about education
and I start tryin, well we had a meeting in
Cincinnati
Needles went and he took me
and when I went, came to Cincinnati Henry Hofstetter just got his PHD
here at Ohio, the first PHD at Ohio State
and the AOA ask Henry Hofstetter and me to form a committee
get a whole lot of telabinoculars
set up a whole examining room in the lobby of the hotel where we had the AOA
meeting so we could show people what optometry was
that's how Henry and I first met and became friends
do you see
and the meeting went on and ended
and the end of the meeting ended
and when it ended, the president, we had a whole roomful of people, which Needles and
I was sitting there
president said
we have finished our scheduled work
is there anyone
in our room that has anything he'd like to bring before the convention
I was a young guy then
very young
I has
and I got up and they said come up in front
now none of you know much about Charles Sheard unfortunately
and I decided that I was going to add this to my talk
because I think you here in Ohio
don't appreciate what you had
Charles Sheard came into optometry oddly
he was a young Princeton graduate in physics
got a job at Ohio State
optometry
what there was, the beginning optometry in very early years
met in Cleveland
and the leaders realized they needed education, these are all exempt people
most of them you remember
very few educated
so he called the chairman
of the physics department
at Ohio State university, he said
we are the American Optometric Association, he used the term optometric
we'd like to have a speaker
who would speak on optic
lenses to our group
the chairman said who are you, the American Optometric Association
the chairman said what is that
nobody knew
and he tried to explain
and the chairman was there thinking about it and Sheard who was a young instructor
at Ohio State walked by the door
he said Charlie come in here
he said there is a group meeting in Cleveland who would like to have
somebody come up and give a talk, he went on
Sheard said who are they, American Optometric Association, he said what is that
and the chairman said I don't know
and Sheard said I don't think that I ought to go
and the chairman said they'll pay fifty dollars Sheard said I'll take it
Sheard told me the story
he came back
he said to the chairman, you never saw anything like it
I have never met a group of people
so avid to learn
so interested in having learning
and he never missed another meeting of group he went always on his own
to that group
the beginning of the group
and eventually
he founded the first school of optometry that gave a legitimate degree
here at Ohio State
now who was Sheard otherwise
he was great scientist
when I got to know him
and looked into him I realized
he had won the highest awards of the American Medical Association
cause he was a great man
in many things
he had a solution for Buerger's disease
he developed a treatment for psoriasis he did a whole lot of things
outside of optometry
he wrote some two hundred and twenty some articles
and established
the American Journal of Physiological Optics and if you go find that old magazine
you'll find it one of the most credible
magazines
in the science of vision that you ever saw
when he was a senator
the he published over two hundred and twenty articles in it
including one called
eighteen steps for an eye examination
in which two of the steps
were considered one step for vertical phorias and vertical ductions and if you broke it up
you got twenty and if you added dynamic skiametry you've got twenty-one
and guess who took it
and suddenly everyone is talking about the twenty one points
of the OEP
it was Sheard's paper
he was
when he died
a committee was appointed of six leading ophthalmologists
six optometrists
which I am proud to say Glenn Fry and I were among them
and six opticians
to publish all of Sheard's writing in a book called the Sheard volume
and I read it and I gave it to Joe Benjamin and when he was looking for some
papers
for a project he was working on new papers
oh look at this it's all Sheard's
and the leading ophthalmologist said to me, wrote
said, if it had not been for Charles Sheard's writings
modern examination of the eye would not exist
he got, won all of the top awards of the American Dental Association
because he worked in that field someway
they won all the awards of the American Optometric Association
he won the top awards of the American Society of Plant Physiology
it just went on
when the Mayo brothers
formed their clinic
and they talked it over and decided that we have to have research in our institution
we'll form the Mayo Foundation
the first scientist that was hired was Charles Sheard
and mentioned Charles Sheard to an optometrist oh you mean the Sheard
criteria
which is a little paragraph in one of his papers
and you don't know what you have here
and what you had here in Ohio
and I thought we were going to talking about
I'd let the people here know
who he was
I was lucky because
when I got to Cincinnati
I was telling you and I raised my hand
and I started down the aisle
to the front, they said come down front
an ascetic looking gentlemen gray-haired gentleman a very ascetic looking man
stood up in the front aisle
walk to the middle aisle where I was coming down
took two steps towards me, extended his hand
he said Dr. Borish, I'm so pleased to know you
I'm Charles Sheard
it's like having Beethoven come out and say to you …
you know
and I got to be
and I thought and I thought
in nineteen ten a man by the name of Flexner
investigated medical schools
medical courses, we don't know this nobody's ever publicize it because
they hushed it
at that time you know what medical education was
you could go to a real medical school which was a few universities
you go to any kind of a dive
you could become an apprentice in the physician's office
you could go anywhere and get an MD
and Flexner investigated and he wrote about and published it and it created an uproar
the American Medical Association, the American Association of Hospitals got together
established a council on education
published a manual
wipe out all these junk places
and that legitimized
medicine and dentistry followed right immediately
and I looked at optometry and I thought here we are right where they were
so I sat down
and I had Gene Freeman who was a colleague of mine at the Northern Illinois college was a PHD in
scientific method incidentally from the university of Chicago
and Gene edited and I wrote
and we wrote the first manual accreditation optometry schools
and Sheard
and what happened at that meeting in Cincinnati was
when I told what I thought about the accrediting system in optometry and all
there was an uproar
the office of the AOA said everybody get out of the room except the officers
and they decided to establish a council on education
and they ask Sheard if he would be chairman and he agreed
so when we wrote the manual
we sent it to Charles Sheard
and Charles Sheard wrote back that this is a very fine work, I'm very pleased with it, but
if I were to say
to the optometrist schools that now exist
this manual was written by two members of one of the proprietary schools
in optometry
they'd never adapt it
I said, leave it anonymous, you don't have to tell them who wrote it
so for a number of years the manual
accreditation was anonymous
well that wasn't enough
so we got to talking about it and we decided we really needed
schools to get together so they could form a uniform curriculum
unified
they could select length of course
and so on and so on, and so
we formed an association of schools and colleges, to form an association of churches schools and
colleges
and the first thing that the association of schools and colleges, Albert Fitch who was one of the real
leaders
was president
and he said we need by-laws and a constitution
and he appointed
Bill Needles
and Glenn Fry
to write the manual
and constitution
and Bill Needles came to me, and said Irv I've got a job for you
which is what usually happened
so I sat down Glenn Fry
and we wrote the manual
the constitution for association
but Glenn forgot all about it, he was so busy with so many great things you know
and when I mentioned at one time to after years you says you know
remember I was on that committee
but I don't remember much else about what took place
You know Glenn
anyhow we wrote, then
contact lenses came in
and we want to standardize that so
a member of the contact lens group
and I sat down and wrote a charter and by-laws for the Association of Contact Lens
Manufactures
setting the standards for contact lenses
and so gradually
my hands were getting into
the structure of the organization, do you see, and
I was happy to do it because I was
very upset with the idea that I'd meet someone oh you're a doctor, you're not a real doctor are you
what is optometry
those kind of things, I got very disturbed by this, do you see
and so a lot of us, I was luckily not alone there were other members of the association willing to
work and get into it and that's where we had to go and we went step by step
we have a two year program in a school
proprietary schools
went to three years
Al Fitch lead the road
Pennsylvania, he was the head of the Pennsylvania school
everybody had two years, Al Fitch established his school a three years
so everybody went to three years
Al Fitch established the school as four years
everybody went to four years
Al Fitch established a year of pre-optometry
and he moved, he was a mover really, you had to give him credit
he moved the profession, we moved up
and pretty soon we were at four and three
we were said, we
matched our peers
in this aspect, do you see
and we kept on working with it, and
then the war came
an optometrists didn't get a commission
so they got an offer
from the leader
ophthalmologist
who was the head of the whole ophthalmology department in the civil service
and that was they could be a master sergeant, top sergeant and practice
optometry
or they could
not practice optometry and become a pilot or whatever you want and get a commission, so did some
and some did the other, do you see
and that man
praised optometry for the job it did in the army with the glasses
and if you don't mind me intermixing a story
a distant cousin of my wife's was an optometrist in New York
and he had a younger brother
the younger brother joined the army at the age of sixteen by lying about his age
the military, now that it had optometrist working in there decided to fit take
soldiers in with glasses up till then they wouldn't take them you know
so they had to get glasses, they had to find someway of supplying lenses and frames
so they looked around and they didn't have anybody in the service apparently that they
knew of it except the optometry school
his younger brother was very ingenious
he picked up a copy of my book
he walked into one of the leading officers of the military
he said this is my cousin
and you know what, the appointed him head of propriety, getting the glasses and the
frames for the military
and he called me on the phone and I said what are you doing in Indiana
oh we got a big optical company here in Indianapolis that I'm visiting, you know
and he told me the story
and you know that young man
he got double time for being in Hawaii you got double time for some other things
that young men
graduated with a pension when he was a kid
so what did he do, he went to Washington and took the civil service
and the civil service appointed him as advisers of the guy who took his place
getting the glasses for the military
and so he was a young, a very young then, he had two
pedigrees and two pensions
one from the army and one from civil service, so he went to law school
in any case
this happened
so
the war ended
and this
ophthalmologist had praised our optometrists
right and left
with the wonderful job we've done in the military
but when he left the service
he had got a job
as professor of
the ophthalmology, head of the ophthalmology, chairman of the ophthalmology department at
Northwestern University
and suddenly everything changed, now optometry was no good
cause he had to play politics
and he went to Washington and talked against our being commissioned
and so we said we got to answer him
he told the Washington committee
they could teach somebody to do what an optometrist does in
six months
you see we got to answer that, so who shall we go to
we'll call on Dean Alfeus Smith
at Ohio State
chairman of the graduate school
why Dean Smith
because Dean Smith
was being honored by us in optometry one year
in Academy
and after he got all the honors he got up he said i've thank you very much for
these honors, he had a lot of them
but you know what I am proudest of
of my whole career
and of course we go what
I brought Glenn Fry to Ohio State University
so we know how he stood, so
we asked him would he, oh sure he would
so he went down to Washington to talk with them
so they sat him down and the committee said to him
doctors, professor, doctor so-n-so a professor at Northwestern
said
he could teach
anybody what an optometrist does
in six months
know what they know
we'd like your opinion
Alfeus said well I can't argue with the professor
if he thinks he can do that in six months, it's possible that he could
but he said at Ohio State University it takes us at least four years
and we got the commission
that's what started it, you see, well
now suddenly
things were not going well
ophthalmology was making inroads, they were, they were fighting hard and they were making efforts to try to get
refraction back
do you see, back to them, it belong to them
we had no business controlling it
we were doing the major business in it, you know and all, and
third-parties entered
and when third parties entered
things changed
why, because ophthalmology was in real trouble too, why
if eighty percent of the cataract surgery
is been done by twenty five to thirty percent of the ophthalmologists
what do the other ophthalmologist do
they don't refract, what's left for them
you can see what was pushing them, do you see
you remember those proportions
so they began and were fighting real hard
and we were suffering too and began to suffer too
and so
Norm Hafner called me on the phone one day
and he said, at the academy meeting coming up he's going to a
talk on this
of what happened
and he said Irv, we're in real trouble and I said I know
he said let's, we gotta have a meeting
who can you think that are progressive looking people, thinking people in optometry we
can get together
and I said well you
Gordon Heath
get Bill Baldwin
and we named a few of them, we got about eight or nine people together
and we want to LaGuardia airport
and we checked in
and we stayed at LaGuardia airport day and night for three days
never got out of the airport
and we discussed the situation
and that's where I and I think, I don’t know if
Norm remembers but I think that's where I brought this problem
I said you know what our problem is
we're not real doctors, you know why we're not real doctors
because to the average person a real doctor is person who handles medicine
and we don't
we're going to face third-party payments
if you have a third party
and you say to him
we have a patient here that went to this optometrist, here's his bill
oh the optometrist referred him to an ophthalmologist here's another bill
what do you think the third party is going to do
he'll say, wait a minute
why not send them to the ophthalmologist in the first place, right
we have no cooperation from pharmacists in the city
that we live in, we're no use to them
we have no, who establishes the public relations
in optho, in all health fields
the drug companies today, their advertising, their promotion on television, all of that
we're of no interest to them, we don't handle their product
said we've got to break the drug barrier
well how we don't do it
well we thought about and thought about it tell you what we'll do
we don't want to start that
Atlantic City thing over again, you know
so we're going to say
that there's a little group here
who are rebels in the field and the American Optometric Association
has nothing to do with them
doesn't acknowledge them
and we're working on our own
but we in the schools are gonna start teaching pharmacology and disease stuff
and everything in the schools to a much greater quote
so that will graduate a whole bunch of students that will suddenly discovered they've been
trained but they can use it
and something will happen
do you see
so that's what we decided to do, well
that's the way we ended
well where do you think we got the opposition from
optometry
optometrists, they were happy with many and what they were doing and they didn’t want to
have to go back to school to learn pharmacology and learn a whole lot of other
stuff
and I got a letters, I got a letter from one of them, Dr. Borish, what have you done to clinical
refraction
you know and all that kind of stuff, they were very unhappy
but we went on and the OEP
opposed us greatly because obviously
the OEP was gonna die if we won and that's what has happened of course you see
to a great extent
at one time remember the OEP ran almost the entire organization
I can remember when they threatened us in Indiana not to open a school
of course they wouldn't want us, the didn't want a university school
and I said to them, gentlemen,
this was, they were the AOA, gentlemen I said
you oppose us about a school in Indiana
and I says
the AOA will consist of one state less
do you know, so
we start, we're all excited we're going to do this, so we took
we had meetings, several meetings
till had a giant meeting in Tucson
the OEP which controlled the AOA
invited
ophthalmology to the meeting
they invited medicine to the meeting, they invited public health to the meeting
they invited every, psychology
everybody that they could
they want as many outside opinions into it do you see
and we went to that meeting
and I remember that psychology guy, I loved, because he got up and he said he says
you know, he said
you optometrists suffer from a great sense of persecution
you do
he's says, but don't think, I'm not chiding you he says
paranoids have enemies too
he said that you know
that was very interesting
and anyhow I ask for the last talk
I got up and gave it
and I used a talk of mine
an incident of mine that I have
been asked to give
and I don't know how many of you have ever heard it , but if you please forgive me
I'll give it to you right now
there were two things I wanted to give out one thing I was going to give you was the
thing on Sheard I believe, this was the place in Ohio
but there were two things
Aroostook county in Maine
is the Northern most county in the
regular United States, outside of Alaska
and it's all woods
and it has about eighteen optometrists in the whole county
now remember I was getting a lot of mail and a lot of opposition from optometrists
I say I, but we were
Aroostook county
they held
optometry *** the first profession you know that demanded
continue education to renew your license
Aroostook county, you had to do it, rather than go somewhere
they'd invite a speaker up to Aroostook county one year I was it
so I went to Aroostook county
and the secretary of state board met me
and he said was going up to the north woods tomorrow morning
and they brought equipment with them
and they cooked their own meals and they shot turkeys, and they brought their guns
and they did things
we had a whole program up in the woods do you see
and I was with him
and I would go with him and I would lecture
so we went, and the next morning I got up real early
and because we were going to leave at day break practically
got down on his wife was preparing breakfast for him and me
he had a big station wagon full of equipment
and I said, he had three children
high school age
and I said where are the children, are they still sleeping
oh no
well, says where are they
oh she says, you don't know
the thing that keeps Aroostook county halfway alive is potatoes
the Maine potato
all the farmers grow potatoes
and the potatoes have to be picked at a certain time, so they close the school
system
and they get big wagons with barrels
put kids names on the barrels
and they bring those wagons out into the
potato fields
and the plows have turned over the field
and the kids start dumping potatoes into the barrels and they get so much a barrel if they fill a barrel
and they get those potatoes picked
I said that's interesting so we drove and he showed me potato cellars and this and that
and we looked
when I could see the kids pick them and all that
now I'm practicing in Kokomo which is the middle of a farm belt
so I knew about farming a bit I knew farmers and friends of patients
and I see a beautiful farm house up on the hill
and I said gee that's a beautiful farm house
now remember this is way back
he says to me dourly, I bet that man owes the United States
government seventy five thousand dollars
I said really
yeah, you can't make a living growing potatoes
he says the only people that make a living are the seed merchants
he says we were,
it used we had some
military bases paid off and that helped but they're gone
we just can't make it, well I said
what do you do
oh he says we called the department of agriculture in one day, one time
and we explained our problem
and they looked the whole thing over and they said did you know
you have a very cool summers
in cool summers
you could grow three crops of broccoli spring, summer and fall
in the same time
and you could do very well
growing broccoli, I said yeah
I garden
and when I go in Indiana I can't grow broccoli in the summers, it's too hot
it all opens up into flowers
but I can grow it in the spring and fall
so I said yes and we're driving along and I finally said Mel
I said I don't see any broccoli,
he says we don't grow it
I says you don't grow it
why don't they grow it
it gets in the way of the potatoes
now this is a true story
and I was thinking to myself
I'm getting all these letters from optometrists so here we are
still trying to live on growing potatoes
well I got a wonderful story that went with it
at this meeting I told the story and of course we broke up the whole house
and later
and Hank Peters said I got another lovely story for you to use with that one
and the story is, in
I think it's Georgia
there's a town that grew cotton
now when they were allowed to use DDT
cotton succeeded because they could kill the boll weevils
but then the government said you can't use
the DDT anymore
the boll weevils came back in
the cotton crop was destroyed
and these, like the potato growers, they
called the department of agricultural, what can we do
department of agricultural came out and said you know this soil reminds me of the soil
in, I think it was Alabama
that grows wonderful peanuts
I beat you could grow peanuts successfully
and you'd make out
and they took his advice
and if you go that town today
in the center square of that town, I've asked people who've been there
there's a monumental pedestal
and on top of that pedestal is a boll weevil
very prosperous, it's a wonderful companion story
well anyhow
there we were, finally I presented
my talk persuaded the whole group to vote for it and we won
the issue
and we decided we were going to do it and the OEP lost out
and we decided we were going to do it
now we're going to do the only way we knew how was the way we had
Norm Haffner
came back from the meeting all keyed up
and he had been asked to speak at the New England council
and he was so fired up with what we had decided at this meeting
that he couldn't help but stand up and tell them all about it
and sitting in the audience was Mort Silverman who was president of the Rhode Island Association
and Mort Silverman listened to
Norm Haffner, got up
got in his car
drove to the capital of Rhode Island
got hold of his legislature and introduced a bill
in Rhode Island right away
never waited for us to do what we were going to the schools
now it took him two years
of hard work
and he finally got it through Rhode Island
and once it passed Rhode Island
the barrier was gone, and there we were, do you see
and that's how all of that happened
well, little by little we have accomplished a lot
we went from
a bunch of a proprietary institutions
into pretty fairly good
legitimate institutions now, you see
certainly we've added some new schools
but at a decent level
we have
broken the drug barrier and we've expanded it regularly, steadily
year-by-year in most of the schools, and we're going to go further
no question about, because
some years ago
we were upset
because
the dean
the chairman of the
pharmacology school
oh, I'm off,
the chairman of ophthalmology
in Indiana
Indianapolis
wouldn't cooperate with our optometry school
and we said, Helveston his name was
we said that's terrible
so John Levine was then on the faculty at Indiana and he knew everybody
and John was a graduate from Oxford, one of the great
Nobel prize
professors
and John had gotten to know them all and he knew Helveston and he said to me Irv he said
I'm gonna call Helveston and tell them you were here at school and that you and
I want to come up and talk to him
so he called Helveston and when he told him I was there Helveston didn't know that
and Helveston apparently knew of me, because I heard John say oh yeah he's here
do you see
and we went up to talk to him
and Dan Gerston who was then at the college tacked himself on with us, so the three of us
went up to talk to Helveston
and that was when ophthalmology was putting up this very strong fight to get
refraction back
and Helveston was of course parrying what he knew what was our objections
and they talked and I listened because I didn't know him
and I sat and listened and they got nowhere, it was like playing tennis, they'd say
something and he'd bat it back, you know what I mean, up and back, up and back
and finally
I said to him, Dr. Helveston if you don't mind my quoting of someone that you
might have hold on a high respect, I said
I would like to quote a statement by Laneem, he said yes
Laneem once said
there are no principles only interests
and I said
and that's what we've been batting about here
but I said there are principles and the principles are with the status
of ophthalmology as it is, and what may happen
with status optometry what it and what may happen
what is the best method of providing the highest level of eye care to the
American public
and Helveston sat perfectly still
for about two minutes looking in his lap, and he looked up at me
alright, let's talk principles
he said what I believe is going to happen
he says that tertiary ophthalmology will take sway of the professional of ophthalmology
the retina specialist
the glaucoma specialist
the rest of the ophthalmologists will become entrance point
to eye care
and I believe optometry will join them
now this was a number of years back
so I've read, watched
what is happening very interestingly
it was interesting to see that
well we're not there yet
but were getting there
I think we have to realize
cause I said Charles Sheard said you have to match
you have to meet them, and we have
and Sheard was a great help to us
because he was respected by everybody in ophthalmology, he could just sit down with
leaders
that this is why this
should be done
and sometimes he even got a few of the leaders to speak for us, you see
of course Sheard died later
but I got to know him very well
over the many years
and I always
he'd write me long letters of what things and then I'd write to him back
he always wrote to me dear Irv
signed is Charles Sheard
I'd write back, dear Dr. Sheard, I could never call him Charles
now my protégé
in a way
Soreta Sony has the same problem with me
I call her Soreta and she calls me Dr. Borish, she can't
call me by my first name you know
but I kid her about it
but anyhow
so I give this talk to students to show where we came from
and of course I've tried to cut is shorter, so
did I make it, and I alright on time, and
we had these groups, these things happening
I think we have to continue them
you have to stop and think of the number of devoted individuals in the field
who had to work on all of these things
for this level
which is the level they were working for
we have to be parallel you see
we have to keep on going, and
I give this talk to the freshmen in these two schools because
it gives them some idea of where they were they have no idea, they don't know, they're
freshmen, they think it was always like this
and one time I finished this talk in New York
no, I was given an award in New York
by the AOA
and when I finished the award, people came up to congratulate me
and up came two young men
they said Dr. Borish, we are students at Southern College
and we have listed to you
and we want you to know that we've taken what you said to heart, you know
and that we appreciate, I said that's wonderful
I'm glad you heard me and so on and so on, they turned around
they left and they started carrying on, and walking on
and they got about from here about halfway up the steps from me and suddenly one of them turned around
and he said, Dr. Borish
we will carry on
and I thought that was wonderful
I don't remember the kids names and so I don't know if they ever did
you know
but I thought it was wonderful
and I think that's something we all have keep in mind
thank you very much for this