I graduated with 58 of my peers from The Ohio State University (OSU) College of Optometry in 1986 with the goal of having my own practice. When I discovered I wasn’t a good office manager, I fell into my current position with Mike Weber, OD in Westerville. My experiences with OSU senior extern students since 2001 at Faith Mission homeless shelter, doing eye exams on home-bound patients, and attending in the Primary Vision Clinic at the College have been most rewarding.
My best achievement is my three children: one an OSU graduate and a lawyer; one currently at OSU; and one soon to be there. I also enjoy fostering animals for Pets Without Parents (a no-kill animal shelter) in Clintonville as well as time with my two dogs, two cats, and fish at home. I also volunteer at the Columbus Zoo. Maybe I should have been a veterinary optometrist; after all, animals need to see too!
Running the OSU outreach clinic has opened my eyes to the unmet needs in the community and the fact that there are a lot of -6.00-D myopes living in their cars—and driving them—around Columbus and many patients with glaucoma who do not have their medications. I hope that my lectures through Optometric Educators, Inc. on street drugs and domestic abuse have opened the eyes of fellow optometrists to what is occurring in our communities.
I am also the advisor for an OSU undergraduate outreach group, Eyes on Health, and we have gone on medical missions with Remote Area Medical for the last three years to provide eyecare in Kentucky and Tennessee. Patients wait outside overnight for the very vision care we often take for granted.
Recently, I have become SCUBA certified with my daughter. That activity takes me into a whole new animal environment—no small feat for someone who has never been a good swimmer!