Subject: What are the LEGAL REASONS that prevent all ODs and MDs from advocating plus-prevention?
Discussion Topic: I had been able to deduce that the plus could be used for mild-nearsightedness, or for people who could still read some of the 20/40 line, but were not yet wearing a minus lens.
Item: I will always agree that you and I must personally check our own Snellen and always exceed the 20/40 line. With skill and resolve, I believe that most people could pass the DMV required 20/20 line, (i.e., both eyes open, read at 20 feet).
I thought that perhaps some ODs had “figured out” the same thing. But I wondered why no optometrist would ever “volunteer” preventive information to me, when I could still pass the 20/40 line, and perhaps could “change my refraction” in a positive direction, by personally-directed wearing of a plus for all close work.
I think that the reason is purely legal. The OD’s do not even want to BEGIN thinking about this issue. But the person must realize why the OD can not or will not help you.
This is what my friend, Don Rehm, calls, “The Myopia Silence”. There are many reasons for the silence, but the result is that you never “hear about” successful plus-prevention, until a person like Todd Becker and Brian Severson actually work their way out of 20/50 vision to self-checked normal – to pass the DMV requirement. Here are the reasons why you will never hear about protecting your distant vision – for life.
FIRST REASON: I talk about a natural eye with refractive STATES, not errors or failures. I indeed do that for “legal reasons”, but I also do it because in pure science, I can prove it.
The MD or OD, simply ignores all science that he can not use on you – in his office. He presumes that “nearsightedness” will never be prevented. He feels that if he says anything, he will be sued for fraud – if you do not get yourself back to 20/20, (refractive STATE of 0.0 diopters.)
SECOND REASON: Prevention (or clearing your Snellen from 20/50 to 20/20) takes about a year of long-term wearing of a plus lens (for all near work.) No exceptions and no complaints from you. Unless you have a strong scientific education, and resolve, no one is going to wear a plus for one year – if “prescribed” by an optometrist.
THIRD REASON: From conversations with Raphaelson (50 years of practice), I found he could get his own children to wear the plus (because he had a clear understanding of the dynamic behavior of the natural eye), but he could not prescribe the plus to the (short-tempered general public), nor could he explain why it is so necessary to wear the plus for near, when everyone assumes that is part of his effort to MAKE MONEY – for something that has never been proven to “work”, AS MEDICINE.
The above truths, are the reason why I never use the word, “cure” or “therapy”, when I mean prevent “negative status” (self measured) for the natural eye.
FORTH REASON: If an effort were made for prevention (in a medical sense), you would be required to justify, human-experimentation. This is why there will never develop a serious preventive effort, among intelligent people.
You must help yourself, by in fact making all the measurements yourself.
If an OD were to attempt to do this, you would not wear the plus. Further, if any nuance happened, (i.e., double vision, or ghosting), and you thought it was because you were WEARING THE PLUS FOR NEAR — FOR A YEAR, you would certainly sue the OD who even attempts, to “prescribs the plus”.
Thus — the plus is not a prescription. But the plus can be used for prevention, if you have the intellectual judgment to do it yourself.
For me, these reasons are rational, logical and science-based. They are the reasons I accept that if I need prevention, I must to do it myself.
Myopiafree 
By Chalmer Prentice, M.D.
Subject: He showed how prevention is possible – before you start wearing a strong minus lens:
———-+ | Chapter IX | +——–
The following are some very interesting experiments in myopia which can be verified by any operator, and which prove that refractive myopia depends on ciliary spasm, and that, even in axial myopia, considerable repression can sometimes be made at the near point. In either class of cases, repression must be made at the near point. In various lengths of time, we shall be able to reduce the myopia one or two dioptres, sometimes more. In most cases satisfactory results will require considerable time and patience; but a few experiments after the following example will suffice to show that in some very advanced stages of myopia, it is possible to suppress, or at least check, its onward course by repression at the near point.
This fact renders the fitting of minus glasses to myopic eyes an open question.
EXAMPLE CASES
Age forty-three; myopia; had been wearing over the right eye -1.25 D, left eye -1 D, with little or no change for the space of two years; eyes in use more or less at the near point. I recommended the removal of the concave glasses for distant vision and prescribed +3.50 D for reading, writing and other office work.
After reading in these glasses for several days, the patient was able to read print twelve inches from the eyes. This patient was of more than ordinary intelligence and understood the aim of the effort. In six months I changed the glasses for reading and writing to a +4 D without seeing the patient. After using the +4 D glasses for several months he again came under my care for an examination, when the left eye gave twenty-twentieths of vision, while the right eye was very nearly the same, but the acuity was just perceptibly less.
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But here is the problem that the person must understand:
Similar results have been attained in 34 like cases;
…but the process is very tedious for the patients, and unless their understanding is clear on the subject, it is almost impossible to induce them to undergo the trial.
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Otis> Anyone considering “prevention” must understand this issue. There is no “easy way” of prevention.
As Chalmers said — the person must fully understand this issue. It is for this reason that I suggest full transfer of “control” to the person himself. If he lacks the motivation to look at the chart, and “clear” himself, then no “third party” (i.e., OD) can do it for the person. This is why I separate a true-medical problem from preventing a negative refractive status in the natural eye. I believe that the above statement simply clarifies that point.
Otis> Plus-prevention is a long-term proposition.
The science of the last 50 years have proven this – and Dr. Prentice is quite correct. You could say it is harder than even he thought it would be.
Is preventing, “negative state” for the natural eye – medicine? I say that it is not – but you must understand this legal definition:
http://www.rmhiherbal.org/aa/f-ahr3-rights.html
Prevention does require personal resolve to do it.