I will start by saying that I have been a patient at this practice since 1987, so nearly 30 years. I have referred many people to this practice because I always had 100% confidence and trust in the doctors, their diagnoses, AND the support staff was wonderful. I trusted them so much that I entrusted my children's vision to them. I will never forgive myself for this, as it has had real life lasting consequences for two of my three children.
When I called to make my annual appointment earlier this year (3 or so months overdue), I was told that my optometrist of 30 years had retired. Umm.....Really? It is mind blowing to me that the new owners of the practice did not have the courtesy to let his (my now retired OD) patients know that he had left the practice. This is normal business practice, and common courtesy. Professional much?
The customer service provided by the support team has gone from outstanding to very sub par within a two year period. It has been a gradual change, but a very significant one. It seems that a minimum of 25% of the support staff is either untrained or lack the skills to perform their job functions.
My family and I ultimately saw Dr. Nguyen, who we liked very much. Dr. Nguyen diagnosed a muscular disorder in two of my children. My children have been seen there for years, and Dr. Nguyen said that my daughter's chart had notes indicating that he (our previous optometrist in the practice, now retired) had noted this disorder a few years ago. It surely would have been great if he had mentioned his diagnosis to my husband and I, her parents.
Three specialist visits later (and about $1,000 later to see said specialists), we have learned that this particular disorder can typically be corrected in a younger child, but the treatment and prognosis becomes less successful as the child ages. My daughter is now 18, and we are sending her (and my son, who is 13) for vision therapy at $110 per child each week for treatment. Needless to say, I am furious. It is bad enough that my children are facing the potential of a lifetime with less than optimal vision. Worse yet is the fact that the failure to treat this disorder earlier has negatively impacted my daughter's academic performance and hence her college prospects. Unforgivable.
Now on to other issues:. My son was fitted for contacts and came home with a starter pack for a week. Unfortunately, the lens popped out or were displaced several times a day for the first few days of the trial. I wore contacts for 30 years, and obviously knew that this meant that the contacts did not fit properly. We called Sunnyvale Optometry to let them know this, and request a refitting/follow up sooner than a week. Without seeing him, it was suggested to us that this was probably a training issue rather than poor fitting lenses. We made an appointment to bring him in for this "additional training" he needed. Guess what? There was no training issue; the lenses did not fit him properly as we suspected. (But were brushed off.) Since the refitting, there has not one instance if the contacts displacing themselves or falling out.
When we made the appointment for the refitting, we were reminded several times to bring in the unused 3 or 4 days of contacts in the trial pack. Seriously? Is Sunnyvale Optometry now a vending machine that is coin operated? After the ordeal my son had been through with several days of lenses spontaneously displacing and falling out, the most important thing to Sunnyvale Optometry was ensuring that that $5 of contacts were returned. I don't even know what to say about this except that this practice has changed. The focus is now solely on collecting every $.50 possible from patients, and I am out of patienCe with the new business model. Though I like Dr. Nguyen very much, I am pretty sure that we won't be returning there.
Update: Dr, Nguyen has left the practice. Do you suppose they let her patients know about this? No, don't be ridiculous. That would be too professional! read more
