NECO mag.qxd - The New England College of Optometry

| NECO ANNUAL REPORT 2008
10
Dr. Godnig has also heard the
crash of calving glaciers, boated
on the Yukon River, cross
country skied on sections of
the famous Iditarod Trail,
stood next to the world’s highest
totem pole, and swum –
very briefly – in the Arctic
Ocean. And who wouldn’t
envy his opportunities to fish
for salmon, halibut and Dolly
Varden in some of the world’s
last unspoiled rivers?
The work itself is serious, steady and in
some ways different than what is typically
found in the Lower 48. Dr. Godnig is sometimes
the first OD his patients have ever seen.
Some of them hunt for food and depend upon
their long distance vision. Most care revolves
around preventive education, hygiene and
arranging follow-up care. Many in the bush
population seek eye care only when they lose
or break their glasses or contacts, or when
they have an active eye disease.
Hygiene is a problem particularly in the
‘honey bucket’ villages where there is little
or no plumbing available. Packaged cleaning
towels and isopropyl alcohol need to be
used to maintain hygiene and cleanliness in
many of the portable clinics. Of particular
concern is the lack of hygiene among many
contact lens wearers who feel it is alright to
share contacts and solutions among friends.
Dr. Godnig often must educate contact lens
wearers on the importance of hygiene in preventing
potentially serious eye disease.
And since he is usually only at a village
for two to three days at a time, follow-up
care in treating certain ocular disorders
becomes difficult. He must often refer patients
to regional clinics for proper follow-up care.
As a Fellow of the College of Optometrists
in Vision Development, Dr. Godnig is concerned
about patients that can benefit from
visual training but often his only course of
action is to prescribe home-based computer
training programs which are usually not
widely accepted by bush patients.
Outsiders can be viewed with skepticism
by Native Alaskans. Dr. Godnig theorizes
this may be because of the abuses that the
Russian traders inflicted on them before