refractive specialist referral

I'm looking for a world-class center with specialty in refractive surgery for difficult cases with a conservative, very research-based point of view.  Preference would be for the West, but could travel further east, as well.  Any ideas?

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

First "conservative" and "research based" are almost mutually exclusive terms. A research based practice is going to be testing new drugs, new techniques, new instruments, etc. Some of these will be better than standard procedures and some will be worse.

A conservative practice will use the standard of care treatment and will not be constantly introducing new and untested, experimental drugs, surgery etc.

You can't have it both ways.

Most of the major advances of refractive surgery have not been made in academic medical centers but in private practices.

I do not know any refractive surgeons in the west.  Here in Missouri where I practice there are two world experts on refractive surgery:

Jay S. Pepose MD    follow this link:
http://www.peposevision.com/page.php?c=2

John Doane MD (disclosure statement, I practice in the same group as Dr. Doane) follow this link:
http://www.discovervision.com/doctors/doane.shtml

There are literally thousands of highly skilled, highly qualified refractive surgeons in the US and with a little research you should be able to find one near you.

JCH III MD