Getting My Eyes Fixed in Mérida Mexico

As I mentioned in our last post, a large part of our decision to come to Mérida was we had medical maintenance issues that needed to be addressed. This is because our USA high-deductable healthcare plan didn’t cover any of these issues, and we knew it would be WAY more affordable to take care of them here.

But today we checked one item off our list – I got my eyes fixed!

And we did it for a very reasonable price.

So to help anyone else who might find this information useful, let’s take a look at what we did and how we did it.

So What Was The Problem?

Even though I am a reasonably spry 53-year-old, I suffered at an early age from cataracts. And not even the normal kind – they were oil drop cataracts. This rare type of cataract doesn’t cloud the lens of the eye like normal cataracts do. They instead disrupt the proper refraction of light as it passes through the lens.

This means your lenses act as kaleidoscopes, instead of properly focusing images on the retina.

Trust me, seeing everything in triplicate is very mentally fatiguing. And is occasionally dangerous!

So at the ripe old age of 40 (for my first cataract) and 50 (for my second), I had the usual cataract surgery that inserted prosthetic lenses into my eyes.

And my vision greatly improved after each surgery.

However, I wasn’t completely out of the woods.

The ophthalmologists who did the surgeries advised me that there might be protein buildup on the capsule membrane that suspends each lens in each eye (a biological reaction to the lens), which could impair my vision.

And starting about 18 months ago, boy did it start to fade!

The symptoms were hard to notice at first.

But as we started our lives as slow-travel early retirees, the fogginess and lack of focus in my vision got worse and worse.

It got to the point where reading was difficult. And Rhonda would sometimes need to help me find things because I struggled to see details in anything other than well-illuminated environments.

It was getting a little scary, to be honest. So as we wrapped up our time in Panama, I knew it was time to address the problem.

Finding a Good Ophthalmologist in Mérida

This was easier than expected.

For our research, we did 4 things:

1. We asked for advice in expat Facebook groups. Finding these groups is easy. Just search “expat [enter city name here]” from within Facebook, and request to become a group member.
2. We searched on Google Maps. We scoured the reviews, focusing on those with high scores, had English-speaking expat input, and a large amount of feedback.
3. We researched physicians at Doctoralia. On this site, you can verify language skills, customer satisfaction, education, and lots of other things.
4. I reached out to physicians and asked questions. Contact info for email and WhatsApp was easy to find through Google Maps and Doctoralia.

After doing all of this, I decided to work with Dr. Alejandro Solis-Castillo, an ophthalmologist who practices in the Altabrisa region of Mérida.

Making a Consultation Appointment

This was easy and happened very quickly.

I reached out to Dr. Solis-Castillo’s office on November 6 through WhatsApp and scheduled a consultation appointment for Monday, November 13 (the first day I was available). I was encouraged by not having to wait months for an opthalmologist appointment, as was always the case back in the USA.

Dr. Solis-Castillo’s office is located in the Star Medica building in Altabrisa (Mérida), where many physicians house their practices.

The offices were modern, clean, and extremely inviting. I avoided taking photos for privacy reasons, but I was impressed with what I saw. Star Medica reminded me of a luxury hotel conference center complex!

I showed up at his office at the appointed time and was promptly seen. The secretary didn’t speak English (which wasn’t a problem for my intermediate level of Spanish) but Dr. Solis-Castillo spoke fluent English.

So in the interest of not losing anything in translation, our entire consultation was in English.

He did a full opthalmic workup on me and determined that my internal eye health was excellent (yay!). And he verified what I suspected – extreme protein buildup on my lens capsules, especially in the left eye.

He said that he could treat my problem by using a weak Yag laser to burn a hole through the posterior capsule membrane (a procedure called a YAG Laser Capsulotomy), which would let light through unobstructed.

I had hoped that this was the main problem, so I enthusiastically agreed!

What I didn’t expect was how quickly he offered to treat me – if I could get to the surgical center, he would perform the procedure the same day!

Rhonda wasn’t with me, so I couldn’t commit to such a quick turnaround without coordinating with her first. So I instead scheduled the procedure for 8 am Wednesday, November 15th, two days later.

The icing on the cake was the cost of everything.

The consultation cost was $800 MXN/$45.47 USD.

And the Yag laser procedure for BOTH eyes would be $4,000 MXN/$229.98 USD total.

Sweet.

This was much better than I was expecting!

The Moment of Truth

This morning, Rhonda and I walked to Clínica Oftalmos, one of the centers where eye-related procedures are performed in Mérida.

We first checked in at the front desk and paid the bill for the procedure.

We then sat in the waiting area where, over the next hour, I received two rounds of dilation drops (it takes about 30 minutes for each round of drops to kick in) to prepare my eyes for the procedure.

Just before 9 am, Dr. Solis-Castillo came out in full surgical garb and admitted me into the Yag laser room. He administered additional anesthetic drops, repeatedly shot lasers into both of my eyes, and then it was over!

Total procedure time – 15 minutes.

He gave me some post-operative advice, a prescription for anti-inflammatory eye drops, and told me to WhatsApp him in 6 days to inform him of my condition.

He said it would probably take about 6 hours for the procedural eye drops to wear off and for my vision to start clearing up. But I could tell right away that my acuity was already much better than before.

As I am writing this post, my vision continues to improve. I underestimated how far my vision had degraded over the last 18 months!

Now everything is much clearer.

I am so pleased!

A Few Words About Dr. Alejandro Solis-Castillo

In short, Dr. Alejandro Solis-Castillo was awesome! 5 stars for sure.

His English was superb. He communicated diagnostic issues without a problem and I enjoyed discussing our mutual language-learning journeys.

He answered all of my questions. And I had many, as a former professor in a medically-adjacent field.

He was extremely thorough. His office had tons of equipment for diagnosis and he used all of it.

He was a really nice guy. We talked about his family, as well as our travels. He was a really caring and affable person!

I highly recommend Dr. Alejandro Solis-Castillo for any opthalmic work that needs doing if you are in Mérida, Mexico!

But now it is time to take a nap. My eyes have been through a lot today.

Until next time…

Thanks for reading!

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