Robyn wrote:
I have been wearing a single contact lens in one eye for all of my adult life (I am thirty years old) and wore glasses throughout my childhood.

I recently had my eyes re-examined, and obtained a new contact lens prescription. At the same time I inquired about glasses as an option as I travel frequently and wanted to see if there was an alternative to dry eyes on long flights. My optometrist suggested that I wait to see how my eyes adapted to the new contact lens, but otherwise that it wouldn’t be a problem if I were to get glasses as an alternative.

Fast-forward to a few months later when I ordered new glasses from his office. One lens is near perfect and the other has quite a strong prescription, as expected. They arrived, and despite my best efforts to adjust to them over a two week period, they do nothing but make me nauseous and motion sick.

I’ve returned to my optometrist for suggestions, indicating that the glasses make my vision strange and give me motion sickness while wearing them, and his response was that glasses will always do this for me - I should just stick with contact lenses.

While that may be true, I’m extremely disappointed (and surprised!) that this recommendation did not come out until after I had purchased glasses based on his assurance that they would be fine as long as my eye adjusted well to my new prescription.

The office will not refund the full cost of the glasses - and are not offering other solutions, either, aside from keeping these costly glasses that are virtually unusable.

Are there rules that govern the dispensation of glasses and vision products (I live in Ontario) - and whether or not customers/patients must be satisfied with the end-product? I have generally been very happy with my optometrist and his expertise, but I can’t help but feel let down by this experience.

ANSWER

Hello Robyn,
I’m sorry to hear that you find yourself in this situation.
Not knowing your exact prescription and visual acuity, it is very difficult for me to make any other suggestions for adapting the glasses.
On the few instances that I have had a patient who is unable to adapt to a prescription (and there is nothing wrong with the glasses themselves), I have offered a refund.  This is not a standard practice, however, and there are no definite rules.  The only thing I can suggest is to return to your optometrist and again voice your concern and ask again for a refund if you feel it’s warranted.

Good luck,
Dr. Donati

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