Eyeworld

EW NEWS & OPINION 20 Of course, we also had ophthalmolo- gists to explain what we do and the medical results we get with IOLs. We chose a general practitioner who would fly his small plane from town to town in the Montana/ Dakota area serving rural communi- ties for whom he was the only doc- tor. He testified that if he had had cataract surgery and required those thick, heavy lenses, he would have been unable to continue flying be- cause of the poor peripheral vision. That would have left these small towns without any doctor. The in- traocular lens was what had allowed him to continue flying and taking care of the patients who needed him. The second patient was a commercial pilot who was able to keep his job with implants but would have lost it if he had to use aphakic glasses. Because everyone admired and revered the television doctor he played, we thought that it would be effective to have Robert Young tes- tify about his experience as an IOL patient. He was hesitant about testifying at first. But I told him, 'We've got a big problem with the FDA wanting to ban IOLs,' and he finally agreed to do it. I'm awfully glad that he did because, as it turns out, I don't think we would have been able to stop the FDA from ban- ning IOLs at that time without his testimony. Dr. Chang: Given that he was an actor rather than a physician or sci- entist, was his testimony effective? Dr. Kratz: I don't think that the FDA officials were impressed at all by Robert Young's star power. I don't think he converted anyone at the FDA because they wanted control over IOLs—that was their whole game. So he testified and he basi- cally said that the IOL surgery saved his career and allowed him to con- tinue acting. They didn't want to hear it. They said, "Thank you very much, Mr. Young." Then they dis- missed him—boom, out the door. When he got into the hallway all the TV stations were out there. Every channel was represented, and they all converged on him. "Dr. Welby, Dr. Welby, what do you think of lens implants?" He said, "First of all, I'm not Dr. Welby. I'm Robert Young. I'm an actor. I play the part of Dr. Welby." Then he grabbed the reporter by the tie and he pulled him up close and he said, "But let me tell you, lens implants saved my career and they should be available to all Americans." That was power- ful. Here was America's doctor telling Americans on national TV that this is what they deserved. That was the first time it became public news that the FDA was trying to close down lens implants, with Robert Young then saying, "Not so fast." The television coverage of his testimony brought it to the public's attention—it got on the evening news and it became a very hot topic right away. Dr. Welby probably enjoyed more public respect than any actual physician in the country at that time. The next day the phone was ringing off the hook at both Con- gress and the FDA. Even though the FDA had already made up its mind to ban IOLs, the directive came down from Congress that you can study IOLs, but you can't ban them. So, thanks in no small part to Robert Young, we prevailed and IOL surgery was saved. EW Contact information Kratz: rpkratz@att.net May 2014 Marcus Welby continued from page 18

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