Grow Your Eye Care Practice: High Impact Pearls from the Marketing Experts

Ming Wang, MD, PhD is the CEO of Aier-USA, Director of Wang Vision Cataract & LASIK Center--An Aier-USA Eye Center, and clinical professor at Meharry Medical College, Nashville, Tennessee.

Growing up in China during the tumultuous Cultural Revolution, Dr. Wang played the Chinese violin er-hu and learned to dance in order to escape deportation and a life sentence of hard labor and poverty, a devastating fate that fell upon millions of youth. He came to the United States in 1982 with ＄50, a Chinese-English dictionary, and a big American dream in his heart. Dr. Wang graduated from Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MD, magna cum laude) in Boston, Massachusetts; holds a doctorate degree in laser spectroscopy; and completed his residency in ophthalmology at Wills Eye Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and his corneal and refractive surgery fellowship at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, Florida.

A former panel consultant to the US Food and Drug Administration Ophthalmic Device Panel and a founding director of Vanderbilt Laser Sight Center, Dr. Wang has published more than 120 scientific papers including a paper in the world-renowned journal Nature and numerous book chapters. He also has edited 9 ophthalmic textbooks including Corneal Dystrophies and Degenerations: A Molecular Genetics Approach and the following books published by SLACK Incorporated: Corneal Topography in the Wavefront Era: A Guide for Clinical Application; Irregular Astigmatism: Diagnosis and Treatment; Keratoconus and Keratoectasia: Prevention, Diagnosis, and Treatment; Corneal Topography: A Guide for Clinical Application in the Wavefront Era, Second Edition; Atlas and Clinical Reference Guide for Corneal Topography; Refractive Lens Exchange: A Surgical Treatment for Presbyopia; Surgical Correction of Presbyopia: The Fifth Wave; and Grow Your Eye Care Practice: High-Impact Pearls From the Marketing Experts.

Dr. Wang holds several US patents for his inventions of new biotechnologies to restore sight, including an amniotic membrane contact lens, an adaptive infrared retinoscopic device for detecting ocular aberrations, and a digital eye bank for virtual clinical trials. His invention of an amniotic membrane contact lens (for which he has obtained 2 US patents) has been used by more than 10,000 surgeons in the United States and worldwide in treating ocular surface diseases to restore sight. Dr. Wang is an investigator in the US Food and Drug Administration clinical trial of a sclera­spacing procedure to treat age-related loss of near vision (presbyopia) and ultraviolet cross-linking for the treatment of keratoconus. He introduced the femtosecond laser to China and performed China’s first bladeless all-laser LASIK procedure using this laser in 2005. He also performed the world’s first femtosecond laser-assisted artificial cornea implantation (Alphacor [Coopervision Surgical Inc]), and the first Intacs procedure in the United States using a new version of Intacs (Addition Technology, Inc) for advanced keratoconus.

Dr. Wang was a recipient of the American Academy of Ophthalmology Honor Award, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of Chinese American Physicians, Kiwanis Nashvillian of the Year, and a Trevecca University honorary doctorate degree.

Dr. Wang is the CEO of Aier-USA, the US expansion of Aier Eye Hospital, the world’s largest eye group with more than 500 locations in 3 of the 5 continents; the founding president of the Tennessee Chinese Chamber of Commerce; and cofounder of the Tennessee Immigrant and Minority Group. He founded a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization named Wang Foundation for Christian Outreach to China.

Dr. Wang introduced many state-of-the-art technologies to the state including small incision lenticule extraction (SMILE), toric implantable contact lens, bladeless all-laser LASIK, laser refractive lens exchange for the treatment of presbyopia and laser refractive cataract surgery, Intacs and cross-linking for keratoconus, and an amniotic membrane contact lens. He runs a busy international referral clinic for post-LASIK and post-cataract surgery complications. Dr. Wang has performed more than 55,000 procedures (including on more than 4000 doctors), and the Wang Vision Cataract & LASIK Center--An Aier-USA Eye Center is currently the only center in the state that offers 3­dimensional (3D) SMILE and 3D LASIK (18 years or older), 3D implantable contact lens (21 years or older), 3D forever young lens (45 years or older), and 3D laser cataract surgery (60 years or older). He founded another 501(c)(3) nonprofit charity, the Wang Foundation for Sight Restoration, which has also helped patients from more than 40 states in the United States and 55 countries worldwide, with all sight restoration surgeries performed free of charge.

Dr. Wang is a champion amateur ballroom dancer and a former finalist in the world ballroom dance championships in the Open Pro-Am International 10 dance. He plays the er-hu and accompanied country music legend Dolly Parton on her CD Those Were the Days. Dr. Wang organized an annual classical ballroom dance sight charity event, the EyeBall, and has drawn attendees from all over the United States and around the world.

The proceeds of Dr. Wang’s autobiography, From Darkness to Sight, are donated to the 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, the Wang Foundation for Sight Restoration, which is dedicated to helping blind orphan children from around the world. The book is being made into a full-length major motion picture.