At 44-Years Old, Giving Thanks to 44 Friends at AAO
Matt Y
I often forget to celebrate American holidays in Asia. Life is busy, and locals don’t have the same holidays, so my native festivities can easily come and go.
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I often forget to celebrate American holidays in Asia. Life is busy, and locals don’t have the same holidays, so my native festivities can easily come and go. Thanksgiving, fortunately, is not one I forget.

This weekend, as we expats often do, I’ll be celebrating by giving thanks to the entire Media MICE team, at a team building weekend at Da Nang Mikazuki Japanese Resorts & Spa . The team has worked hard all year – and as I mentioned to friend Amy Leger at Alcon this week on a call – it is like a little Media MICE miracle in Vietnam, as only with our local friends and colleagues could we have built the incredible team that takes us across the world with significance, thanks to new society partnerships with The European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (ESCRS) and American Academy of Ophthalmology .

That’s a grand irony of my life, personally. I had to come all the way to Asia to help make a difference back West, and well, the journey was so worth it.

And so while I wait to give thanks to my colleagues soon, I’d also like to celebrate this Thanksgiving weekend by giving thanks to 44 friends who I saw in America at the AAO. Why 44? Because I also recently celebrated my 44th Birthday in Vietnam (another holiday I do not overlook;), and I figured I’d celebrate 44 friendships belatedly….

The Orbital: Gold Rush Foundation fundraiser celebrated David Pyott and Molly Pyott , philanthropists. The David and Molly Pyott Foundation, has been very active worldwide – for example donating $4 million to transform eye care in Zambia through Orbis; also by providing ophthalmology-related scholarships to students from the developing world through the The University of Edinburgh ; and through other initiatives.

David, also the former CEO of Allergan , shared with me some of his life story at The Orbital, which I think is inspirational for any of our children looking to make their way in the world. David grew up in India, spent time living in Malaysia, and has clearly spent much of his life helping to transform eye care in Africa.

As someone who has lived abroad since I was 26, I can only imagine what kind of experience it would have been like instead growing up as a non-citizen in India before the age of 10, and how many life-enriching experiences one would have to form the bedrock of one’s existence. To hear David speak about that, and his other world ventures, is like having a Masterclass in world-class conversation. I’m certainly looking forward in the future to the possibility of covering some of David and Molly’s charitable initiatives, as well as others like them, in greater depth.

Speaking of Allergan, Andrew Stewart is an old friend from his days spent there. He now serves as President, Global Pharmaceuticals and International Consumer at Bausch + Lomb , and sits on the Executive Leadership Team there.

Andrew is a great connector. Surrounding the Miebo launch – “a drop that treats dry eye in a new way,” as the company says – Andrew was making the rounds at AAO connecting stakeholders including myself with the venerable Brent L. Saunders , B+L CEO and Chairman of the Board, who looks just like his picture. That’s a talent, as I sometimes age 10 years at a given show due to nonstop global conference action and jet lag.

Andrew and I also recently had a great 1 a.m. conversation ahead of EURETINA where we spoke about the importance of media engagement from East to West. Let’s face it: executives often need to put in the time to make things happen, no matter what time it is. Nowadays, I have some of my best correspondence on the weekend. In any event, we have a great relationship supporting B+L in Asia, and we’re looking forward to doing that more in Europe and the United States as well.

Gavin Tachibana has been our liaison at AAO in our capacity as Official Contractor of Video Marketing. I have to say, Gavin is a gentle guy of strong moral character, and it’s really wonderful to collaborate with people like him. We also share a passion for the culture of Vietnam, which is easy to do.

I saw Gavin enthusiastically contributing to making the aforementioned Orbital: Gold Rush Foundation fundraising event a huge success, along with his colleagues like Todd Lyckberg and Karen Rice.

I shared a fun photo moment with Susan MacDonald and Carey Powers at the Orbital event, and learned more deeply what Susan does as CEO of Eye Corps . Eye Corps is right at this very moment on an eye care mission in Tanzania, where Susan mentioned she dedicates her work to exclusively.

I’d really encourage m’eye friends to check out the website at: https://www.eyecorps.org/

It explains in detail why they do so much outreach in Tanzania, but suffice it to say, as they say: “Globally, nearly 1 billion people live with moderate or severe distance vision impairment. Of those 1 billion people, 94 million are impacted by cataract impaired vision, most of whom live in low to middle-income countries such as Tanzania where limited access to eye care can mean a life of blindness.”

Carey, meanwhile, is a dynamo and is the founder and CEO of Powers & Company , which supports emerging companies in health care and biosciences. She’s also the talented host of The OIS Podcast, so yet another fantastic individual bringing great insights to our industry.

I met Glacial Multimedia CEO Michael Dobkowski ’s partner Onur Birsen in London earlier this year, and then Michael came up to say hi in the most enthusiastic way. These guys are clearly a dream team and are lucky to have found each other years ago.

I’m also lucky to have met them more recently, as the vibe is so good, and great collaborations are in store for making the physician/patient divide a bit smaller.

I met Tarun Jaggi so many years ago now in India, when Robert Anderson and I used to go as many as 6 times a year. Those were the days we didn’t know nearly as much about global media engagement as we do now, and we learned the hard way – by trekking all over India.

Tarun was kind enough to support us along the way, and our friendship continues into America and beyond. Tarun is the owner of Optitech Eye Care, which lately has been marketing the AcuAxis ophthalmic ultrasound and biometer ruler, as well as Fluorescein Strips to analyze the integrity of the tear film and detect abnormalities on the ocular surface.

After meeting at Winter ESCRS in Istanbul close to a decade ago, Yvette Viscuso and I have really enjoyed bumping into each other as fellow globe trotters. Yvette and her family back in the day wore some great booth costumes, so we bonded over that, and her family is just delightful.

She is the CEO of Peschke Trade, markets corneal crosslinking modalities worldwide, and looks forward to FDA clearance in the near future.

Eugene VanArsdale (or Gino, as he is so affectionately known), has been one of my most personal ardent supporters for years. Somewhere in the back of our minds, being from the Tri-State Area, there’s always a Philly Cheesesteak joke.

But Gino, no laughing matter: How ‘bout dem Eagles?!

They beat the Cowboys right at the Fort-Worth, Texas-based Alcon booth at AAO, and sorry Alcon , but it was a beautiful sight to behold.

Keeler , meanwhile, has partnered with Waggoner to offer state-of-the-art color vision screening worldwide. Now that brings me to my main man, T.J….

Ever since T.J. Waggoner came out for our CAKE & PIE Expo 2.0 in Da Nang, and we barely floated down a Vietnamese river due to holes in our kayaks, we were bonded for life. T.J. is just a rad dude, but he’s also the CEO of Waggoner Diagnostics , and awesome co-friend of Gino as mentioned.

Waggoner has also done a lot of charitable initiatives, like giving away free screening tools in India, most recently at the Asia-Pacific Optometric Congress this year outside of New Delhi.

We’ll never forget T.J.’s catchphrase: “Teamwork makes the dream work!”

The ESCRS executive group was at AAO, and it was great having a nice dinner together to discuss future eye care expeditions. As a society, the ESCRS has proven to be a mover and shaker not only in Europe, but around the world. As their Digital Media Partner, we’re looking forward to supporting in great new ways in 2024 and beyond.

Stay tuned for yet another fantastic ESCRS just around the corner: That’s right, Winter ESCRS in Frankfurt, Germany!

But of course, we have to remember the man that makes things happen: Adam Said on behalf of MCI , which supports the ESCRS meetings. Adam courteously stopped by our booth at AAO along with Burkhard Dick – sorry to miss you Burkhard, as I was coming from the South Hall to the North Hall. That AAO…it’s like suburban sprawl for exhibits (not that anyone minds as big business needs to happen there).

Burkhard and I had a fantastic time as “Blues Brothers,” interviewing one another at ESCRS Vienna, and I’m sure we are looking forward to our next cameo!

Domenic von Planta summed up our dinner together in San Francisco best: What a great “b(r)ay(n)storming” discussion. Indeed it was, by the San Francisco Bay.

Watch out, world. SCHWIND eye-tech-solutions GmbH is coming up with some great new plans to support its SCHWIND ATOS with SmartSight. Since Domenic took over as CEO last year, the company has grown from strength to strength.

Domenic and I also enjoy swapping CEO leadership stories, which I’d like to encourage further in our field, as even executives can be siloed within their respective stakeholder communities. Over the past year, CEOs like Domenic, Kerrie Brady at OcuTerra Therapeutics , Nick Curtis at LENSAR, Inc. , and Christian Kirchubel at OCULUS, Inc. have become great friends to share with, as we navigate the complexities and opportunities of our field. That makes me wonder whether a Satellite CEO Roundtable alongside congress should be in order to share further experience…hmmm…could be good in a place like APAO Bali…

Dr. Wei He MD PhD MBA heads up He Vision Group 何氏集团 , which all m’eye friends should take note of with interest in China. This group makes major impact there, and includes the He Eye Specialist Hospital group, and is invested in global companies like Adaptica S.r.l. .

Keep an eye out for when Dr. He walks by in his always fancy manners of dress, and with even fancier thoughts about the future of eye care.

It was great catching up with Krysten Williams at the physical Heidelberg Engineering booth. But did you know Heidelberg Engineering also has a prominently displayed virtual booth on their US homepage?

Not all of us were fans of virtual booths during the pandemic (as we were essentially forced against our will to meet non-physically). But it is great to see the technology now enables an important presence beyond showtime. I just visited their virtual booth again, and learned more about SPECTRALIS, ANTERION, and something called the EYE EXPLORER. Check it out at https://www.heidelbergengineering.com/us/virtual-booth/

Adrienne Graves has had quite a stellar year with the acquisition of Iveric Bio, An Astellas Company , where she was Chairman of the Board, by Astellas Pharma . At AAO, she mentioned once that was completed, she left off right away to get involved with another venture necessitating her time. Adrienne you never stop, and you’re a gift to the eye care community.

Meanwhile, Adrienne walked with Priyanka Sood , who is Chief of Service at Emory Midtown Hospital at Emory Healthcare, and I also heard that some time ago she received her medical degree from McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University . A fellow alum. Go ‘Cats!

Christopher Willis and I, he recently shared, are the same age, and I’m glad to hear it. Chris is the better looking brother from another mother, but I’m happy to age like less fine wine next to him…no problem.

I see a few other traits in common, Chris. Same college/uni years: ‘97-01. And, as I researched, I believe we have similar high school mottos: Semper Quaereamus Virtutem for you, meaning “Let us always seek virtue,” and Tenui Nec Dimittam for me, meaning “Take hold and never let go,” which i suppose someone persistently virtuous does. I also suspect the quality of fries/chips was about the same too in the cafeterias.

Rayner , of course, has been producing some great Peer2Peer education all year long, and beyond novel IOLs, markets Omidria as well.

Speaking of Omidria, Cathleen McCabe and I not only had a thoughtful time chatting about that, but we also found a nearby fern, whose company we enjoyed immensely. I pretty much said it all before in my post, and I’ll say it once more: We can’t wait to make more creative and innovative content together to spread the eye care word!

We’re so proud of our KOL Influencer Dr. Ashraf Armia MD, MSc., FRCS (Glasgow, UK),FACS, FWCRS for his participation in Ophthalmic Hub 2023, which happens in Kyiv, Ukraine. Check out the website at: https://ophthalmic-hub.com.ua/hub-eng

Ray Sievert has some of the best jokes in the business, from all over the world, and I could go on hours listening to them. But as it turns out, there was plenty of other reason to talk too.

Like the iTrace Prime – “Visual Function Made Simple,” according to Tracey Technologies . iTrace Prime “extends the effectiveness of existing features with improvements to imaging quality and the wavefront capture process, improved navigation between displays, batch saving and printing, improvements to Toric Planner customization, and more.” In fact, two new displays provide even more information in a single, rapid scan.

We’ve enjoyed interviewing our KOL Influencer Dr. Soosan Jacob all over the world this year for MICE TV, including at ESCRS in Vienna and most recently at AAO. Check out her thoughts on the actual utility of deepfakes in ophthalmology here out of AAO on MICE TV: https://youtu.be/SONJLDKZbak?si=lq2aCQatDdYIsL-K&t=157

It’s always good seeing Ike Ahmed , but I especially appreciated it this time around. While 20 years ago, I interviewed Ike regularly for articles, these days, he is appearing in some great KOL filmed interviews. We’ve had some great experiences together with OCULUS, Inc. and MicroSurgical Technology this year, for example. And then came the big compliment: “You run a big media company now, man.” I mentioned how much I appreciated him saying that, and that really it only turned out to be “big” over the past year or two. We’re of course looking forward to covering Ike’s innovative thoughts much more, and perhaps in ways that Cathy McCabe suggested above. 2024 is looking very creative and bright for top ophthalmic communicators like Ike.

It was great seeing John Sheppard jamming on his electric keytar at the Fight Blindness Live Music & Dancing event featuring iDox.

John, president of Virginia Eye Consultants , was always my favorite interview more than a decade ago, as we spoke on a cell phone line connecting Beijing and the Virginia Beach area. Often that line would hold through tunnel after tunnel that John was driving through, or if it didn’t, we’d connect and reconnect to get through five interviews at a time. He was my go-to man for content, ophthalmically omniscient, and apparently also virtuosic.

Bindu Manne was the great photographer behind the ESCRS friendship photo at AAO, which ESCRS shared. She’s a connector-in-chief that always shows up at the right time. Like when I needed an Uber from iDox charity event home when rides were scarce... there was Bindu graciously offering to drop me off.

Bindu has been a key consultant with TherOptix , Ocuphire Pharma , American Society of Ophthalmic Administrators (ASOA) , and many other groups of late, but like I said, her real role is super connector. Remember that, and reach out to Bindu for that kind of support – I hope she doesn’t mind me saying so. Anyways, she’ll probably connect someone to you first before you know it.

After our podcast together earlier in the year for her show, Nerdy Optometrist , Ukti Vora, MBA, M. Optom, FAAO and I enjoyed a little reunion on the AAO show floor. I can’t get over what a great personality Ukti is for all things eye care, and really look forward to finding more collabs together.

Ukti also has a day job as regional product manager for Topcon Healthcare , and well, the company couldn’t have better representation in my view.

Topcon was busy at AAO promoting its all-new TEMPO perimeter, meanwhile.

“TEMPO provides fast, accurate, and comfortable visual field testing,” the company noted. “In fact, it is 39% faster than Standard Automated Perimetry (SAP) With in clinical testing and functions in ambient light. Performance is equivalent to the gold standard with excellent repeatability.”

Paul Huff, MBA USC and Drew Parks , of SUN PHARMA , are thoughtful friends to say hi. We had a great pic together at AAO, which really provided some cool venues around for social-media worthy photos.

Meanwhile, Sun Ophthalmics markets products BromSite (bromfenac), Cequa (cyclosporine) and Xelpros (latanoprost).

And Paul, here’s that connection with Robert Anderson you were looking for. Feel free to message over LinkedIn in case you didn’t reach him at the show. Ahh LinkedIn , the ultimate connector.

Adam Szaronos , the CEO of Trukera Medical , was holding court at their booth at AAO, and fortunately was there when we stopped by to describe the ScoutPro, which is the “power of osmolarity testing in the palm of your hand.” It relies on the 3 Ps, apparently: being Portable, Practical and Precise.

As a reminder, TearLab officially changed its name to Trukera Medical in 2022, but it’s good to keep the word out there about this as the company is seeking to push innovation there in a new direction.

All the best for the journey ahead, Trukera!

After a great meeting with a real godfather of biosimilar knowledge, Dr. Ashish Sharma at European Society of Retina Specialists (EURETINA) in Amsterdam, I had the chance to sit down with Josh Pettit and Nina Ohara, PharmD, MBA, MS, RPh , of Coherus BioSciences , to learn more at AAO.

After the FDA approval of CIMERLI in August 2022, apparently the biosimilar of ranibizumab has been going gangbusters stateside. Josh Pettit, VP of Sales for Ophthalmology, and Nina Ohara, Executive Director and Brand Lead of ophthalmology, clearly couldn’t be happier with the performance, as it has gained rapid and considerable market share.

I enjoyed stopping by the CSO Construction of Ophthalmic Instruments booth at AAO and seeing friend Vieri Badalati , because I realized all their KOLs on the board are mutual friends. Namely: Drs. Francesco Carones MD , Prof. Farhad Hafezi, MD, PhD, FARVO and Dan Reinstein .

Clearly, there is some KOL power behind CSO’s diagnostic prowess, which includes the MS-39 AS-OCT, the SIRIUS+ Tomograph and Corneal Topographer (and many other topographers), the OSIRIS line of aberrometry, slit lamps, fundus cameras, and much more. In fact, the offering at CSO is much more extensive than I realized.

Erik Bror Bonn , Chief Commercial Officer of MicroSurgical Technology and an Executive Board Member, and I sat down for a great discussion at AAO after our video collaboration at ESCRS. In fact, I didn’t realize it at the time but I’m so pleased to see MST using this video on their homepage as it really solidified the great collaboration the company has had over the years with the celebrated Dr. Ike Ahmed to innovate.

Big companies like Alcon and J&J may get a lot of the glory, but it’s SMEs like MST putting useful instruments in the hands of surgeons that are advancing ophthalmology day by day, and surgical hand by hand.

The TrabEx Pro, for example, is now being promoted as an innovative dual-blade design that allows excision of the Trabecular Meshwork. In this case, the serrated dual blades are precision engineered using femtosecond laser technology. So it’s the perfect blend of both the laser and blade world advancing our industry.

Nikolas Arrington , Regener-Eyes® VP of Sales Operations, hung out with my new Media MICE colleague Sven Mehlitz and I at their booth for a bit. Regener-Eyes by the way is an OCT drug to relieve dryness of the eye. There’s a nice peer-reviewed journal article explaining all about it on the company homepage for those interested.

Further, a company program called Social-Eyes seeks to connect experts and patients on related and important topics. Check it out here. Definitely worth a look: https://www.regenereyes.com/social-eyes/

Sujatha and Mohan are longtime friends from India – a great wife and husband ophthalmologist team. But now their daughter Sashwanthi Mohan is upping the ante, as she’s becoming a powerhouse of an influencer on social media. In fact, she is literally our Media MICE KOL Influencers this year, hailing from the country of Dubai.

It’s great to see as the generations go by, there is so much hope for a bright ophthalmic future! And also, that makes me middle-aged Matt at this point, as it seems at least half of ophthalmology is now younger than this Young. Good gosh!

Manuela Sutter-Meler , of Haag-Streit , is always a friendly face on the show floor.

The company has always had great diagnostics, but as a reminder, they also are a leading provider of virtual reality simulators for training ophthalmologists, optometrists and medical students.

Take the Eyesi Slit Lamp, for example, which “is a high-end diagnostic training system for ophthalmologists and optometrists,” the company notes. “Its virtual reality technology is integrated into the original hardware of the BQ 900 slit lamp model from Haag-Streit Diagnostics. Trainees can examine virtual patients with the biomicroscope, fundoscopy lens, or gonioscopy lens.”

Dr. Ivo Ferreira Rios M.D. , our great friend in Latin America, reported his own excellent wrapup of the AAO conference here:

Ivo, and his Oftalmo University , are our great partners in that region of the world, and we promised to stay in touch and take things to the next level together in upcoming years in LATAM. Ivo really is the top KOL in Latin America for anyone interested to reach out.

He’s also been a big proponent of simulation, such as methods by Haag-Streit above. Ivo is a really, really innovative person, who does incredible work, and is an influencer in and from a fascinating part of our world.

It’s been many years since I first met Camille RAULO at ESCRS, and since then we have had some wonderful collaborations.

The exciting thing about FCI Ophthalmic Community , which is of course a Zeiss company, is that they continue to integrate Katalyst from the 2022 acquisition. Essentially, the acquisition has allowed FCI to expand its advanced surgical retina portfolio, which now includes cools stuff like illuminated laser probes, chandeliers, backflushes, and cannulas.

Jugoslav Isakovic (Jugo) is a super friendly fellow, and always worth a catch-up.

This time we spoke about why “More physiological IOP matters,” specifically because he was wearing a pin that said “Ask my why it matters.”

Indeed, according to Alcon, the “CENTURION Vision System with ACTIVE SENTRY is designed with advanced technology to enhance safety and confidence during surgery with near to physiological IOP and enhanced chamber stability, even in the most challenging cases.”

We look forward to more great digital discussions with Jugo in the near future.

Last but not least, I always enjoy talking to longtime friend Scott Griger because he lives in the Chestertown, Maryland-area, where I went to college with Media MICE COO Hannah Nguyen . Ah, those were the days!

Scott is now Sales Manager, Norlase , in North America. And interestingly, as they say “The Next Norlase Innovation” is the Echo, the “world’s first truly portable pattern laser.” Check it out on the Norlase website here: https://norlase.com/

That’s 44 friends at AAO, in my 44th year, and also during my 20th AAO, where we were an Official Contractor. There is much indeed to celebrate, and I am so thankful m’eye friends for all of you, that you are in my life.