Most of us take for granted the fact that our eyes are in full working order and we can see clearly enough to fully enjoy life. But the human eye is an an extremely complex and delicate bodily organ and we should be very grateful to those medical specialists who look after our vision.

The precise term for the medical specialisation relating to the eye is ophthalmology – an blend of two Greek words which literally translate as ‘the science of eyes’. Since the human eye can need both medical and surgical treatment, ophthalmologists are considered to be specialists in both fields.

As long ago as 800 BCE, medical men had enough understanding of the human eye to be able to identify several eye complaints and to have come up with relevant surgical techniques and equipment to try to treat some conditions, and across the centuries scientists and specialists have increased their knowledge of the human eye and created treatments for various complaints.

Then, in 1805, the first dedicated ophthalmic hospital was opened in London, and it is still there now under its famous title of Moorfields Eye Hospital. The hospital is now a global centre of excellence for ongoing research to improve even further the diagnosis and treatment of all ailments and other complaints that may cause trouble for the human eye.

In order to become an ophthalmologist, a medical student will need to complete several years of detailed specialist training, working in conjunction with qualified ophthalmologists to learn the required skills before finally being appointed as a consultant. A lot of consultant ophthalmologists specialise in areas which are of particular interest to them and will hold specialist surgeries for patients with those particular complaints.

Most people actually don’t understand just how much more an ophthalmologist is trained to do when compared to the optician who we make an appointment with for basic eye tests and for the prescribing of glasses or contact lenses. But for any problems that involve actual surgery – whether a conventional operation or Laser eye surgery, an optician has to send the individual to an ophthalmologist to have treatment.

When a patient is referred to the expert consultant, many kinds of eye treatments can be undertaken. Improvements in technology in recent years mean that the standard of diagnosis, and consequently treatment, continues to move on and a number of procedures now are carried out at an outpatients appointment using a local anaesthetic instead of the patient having to check into hospital for a few days. Some of the most effective changes have been prompted by the increasing employment of Laser eye treatments, as these simply use the Laser eye beam to treat the affected part of the eye, instead of needing to use actual surgical equipment, which results in far less likelihood of problems or infection.

A lot of the more complex eyesight problems can clearly be affected by other health problems, and so the ophthalmologist will work together with the other consultants who are providing treatment. And naturally, a number of problems with the eyes including cataracts and glaucoma are often age related, so there must be a good empathy towards other problems which can have an effect on the more mature patient – not specifically issues associated with the eye complaint, but problems including mobility or breathing difficulties.

Luckily, most people make their way through life with their only vision problems being the requirement for glasses or contact lenses eventually. But for people who have more unpleasant eye complaints, it is good to know that treatment is continuing to evolve and get better every year, whether it be more precise Laser eye surgery, more delicate tools for cataract removal or speedier diagnosis and treatment of more serious problems.

I have never been especially good at human biology, I have to say that the only medical terms I’m really know anything about are the few that I’ve come across through personal experience. I’m fortunate that I don’t have too many health issues myself, but I certainly have relatives who suffer from more than their fair share.

Recently I was embarrassed at how sketchy my medical understanding was when I received a call from my employment agency giving me a temporary job at a podiatrist’s office. ‘It’s to do with feet’ was all of the description that the member of staff at the agency could give me, so when I had finished the call I thought that I ought to find out more. My initial thought was that it was supposed to be a chiropodist who treated the feet, and it seems I am not the only person under that impression. But evidently now the correct title for those who advisepeople about their feet and lower legs is a podiatrist. I’m not sure why this renaming of the title of the profession was necessary, but the NHS website assures me that there isn’t the slightest difference between them.

So then I began to wonder about other medical professions. For example, what is the difference between a dentist and an orthodontist? I’ve only ever visited a dentist to have a few fillings and a couple of crowns. This time there is a distinction between the two, as I discovered when an acquaintance started a new job as a dental receptionist. A dentist completes work on the teeth and gums, mostly things like repairing damaged teeth, treating tooth decay and advising with hygiene issues which can make the gums unhealthy.

An orthodontist initially trains as a dentist, but then goes on additional studies to learn about jaw and tooth alignment, so they carry out work such as using braces to rectify the problem of crooked teeth. This could explain why I didn’t realise there was a difference. When I was a youngster, very few kids were ever prescribed braces for their teeth, whereas in 2011 it appears that almost all children wear them at some point. I can only assume that the idea has become more widespread as each generation is more concerned about physical looks and correcting defects at an early age.

Another subject where I had no clue until a few months ago is the treatment of eye problems. Optician and ophthalmologist, exactly the same – yes? No, absolutely not, as I’ve discovered since an elderly relation was referred for Laser eye surgery. To start with, she had an appointment with an optician for a standard eye test and that is when her vision problems were discovered. The optician went through the different options for treatment, amongst which was Laser eye treatment, but explained that as an optician he would not be able to carry out the treatment himself. So he passed on a referral to her doctor, who then had to forward on the referral to the Ophthalmology Department at the nearest hospital so that she could have the operation.

By then, I’d done some research and confirmed what has now become quite obvious – that the ophthalmologist is the specialist who can carry out the conventional and Laser eye surgery operations, whereas the optician is simply employed to test the eyes and diagnose any defects. Basic problems such as wanting a prescription for spectacles can be handled by the optician. More complicated problems which need Laser eye treatment, conventional surgery or other specialised treatment do need to be handled by an ophthalmologist.

So I’ve had the chance to extend my medical knowledge somewhat recently due to events connected to me or to people I know. It’s confirmation that it’s much easier to learn and relate to things if they have had an impact on you, instead of simply reading a book or looking for information online. Having said that, I’m more then happy to remain ignorant about some of the more nasty areas of medicine if it means that neither I nor anyone that I know has to deal with serious health problems!

Over the years, we all discover that many parts of our bodies don’t function quite as well as we expect them to and some unfortunate individuals seem destined to suffer from one problem after another all through their lives. However, many of those people who seem to suffer from countless health complaints often have a resilience that the rest of us can only envy.

I can name two such individuals connected with me who have displayed a determination that has kept them alive for a lot longer than medical science would have estimated. My father developed asthma as a teenager, which meant that he regularly went through bouts of breathlessness and had to use medication from a young age. Around the age of 45 he was hospitalised with a very severe asthma attack and soon after he suffered a cardiac arrest. We were told that he had roughly a fifty per cent chance of pulling through and we were told that if he did live there was a considerable likelihood that he would have experienced some level of brain damage as his brain had been deprived of oxygen for too long.

However, he did survive and his brain was not affected intellectually although his physical reflexes had slowed down somewhat. A few years later, whilst hospitalised again after another severe asthma attack, he advised the staff of other symptoms and was diagnosed with bowel cancer. Fortuitously it was at a very early stage and he had successful treatment for it.

Later in life, his lungs and heart became so badly damaged that he had no option than to be hooked up to a permanent oxygen feed and became completely housebound. His lungs were so awful that just shifting from one chair to another would make him gasp for breath and totally unable to manage anything else at all. Even lifting a glass to his mouth was impossible. He finally passed on two years ago, but to get to his seventies in spite of suffering from so many problems truly was an achievement.

The mother of a very good friend has suffered a similar list of health problems. She got polio as a youngster, was confined to an iron lung throughout her childhood and was told she would never walk again. She baffled the doctors by managing to walk and went on to have a career as a singer and after that became a nursery teacher. She married and gave birth to three children even though she had been advised that she was probably sterile, and spent years caring for her husband after he broke his neck and developed a severe heart infection.

However, after her husband’s death, she had a nasty fall which shattered her ankle and this, coupled with the onset of severe arthritis in both legs and arms, led to her becoming practically housebound. She developed a lung complaint and then began to have problems with her vision. An operation on one eye left her in a lot of pain, and although she was recommended Laser eye surgery for the other eye, she refused to have it done after the bad experience she’d had with the conventional eye surgery.

A chest infection a couple of years ago had a detrimental effect on her already diseased lungs and left her in hospital literally minutes from death, but somehow she managed to hang on to life and slowly recovered. However, she is now in need of a constant oxygen supply and has had no choice other than to move into a residential care home where her mobility problems and breathing complaints are checked daily.

Since moving into the home though, she is now able to mix with other people as opposed to spending most of her time alone at home. She now takes much more pride in her appearance, and has become a firm favourite with the carers due to her feisty opinions on life. Whilst she will always say that the place doesn’t feel like ‘home’, it has undoubtedly given her a greater zest for life. A recent trip to the optician again suggested that she have Laser eye treatment on her other eye as she was having problems even watching television, and this time she actually agreed to be referred to an eye specialist for a Laser eye surgery assessment.

She recently visited the local hospital where a very friendly specialist carried out the Laser eye treatment and at last she realised just how bad her vision had become. Her only complaint now? That when she uses the mirror, she can now see how old she looks!

Doctors have many responsibilities along with the high expectations. As a primary reason you may demand the time for yourself which will be assigned for your patients who will not care for any of your personal invitations. Additionally, all the doctors are offered high class reputation as their tough and extensive training in their medical school, they are presumed to be knowledgeable in health matters. In fact experienced medical doctors are of great repute in their field. All look out for the experienced doctors.

Thus only for this reason, after completion of the residency and as a fresher to medical world,a young doctor who’s not accustomed to the thousands of questions patients often ask doctors could put the patient in an abstruse situation.

This will make you search for different medical questions. Finding medical questions online is one of the ways to enhance medical practice and it’s easy since it does not entail opening and flipping through the pages of hundreds of text books after walking through the Library shelves. You can find the solution in the web within a minute.

There are a couple of avenues for finding medical questions online. It is true that one can easily get all the answers related to the medical practice in the search engines through research and medical sites.

Quite a number of Search engines provide medical questions online but have a general approach to your quest as they most times do not provide the actual medical questions, nor narrow it down in their search results, but provide you with links or domain names to help you get to the medical questions.

The comparison should be done on the basis of the quality of search engines that the search engine is providing. The search engines are same every where as they cover all the same aspects.

Some medical questions online include: “What makes ibuprofen different from aspirin and paracetamol?” “What causes hypertension?” “When a patient suffers from Cardiac arrest, how do you report the situation and determine the actions?” many more question to clear your doubts.

Getting the know how prior to the problem is a sign of a good medical career; but also makes you a better and well informed Doctor.

Here’s a website that will cover various Health Questions.