Advisory Board

Dr. Al Sommer is Professor of Ophthalmology at Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and John Hopkins University School of Medicine, and former Director of the Dana Center for International Ophthalmology at Johns Hopkins. He is a recipient of the Lasker Prize — the second highest biologic honor after the Nobel. He won the award for his work on vitamin A deficiency and blindness in poor children around the world. Sommer is currently coordinating an international effort to eliminate blindness caused by vitamin A deficiency.

Dr. Chang is a Summa Cum Laude graduate of Harvard College and earned his M.D. at Harvard Medical School. He completed his ophthalmology residency at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) where he is now a clinical professor. Dr. Chang is serving a five-year term as chairman of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Annual Meeting Program Committee. He chairs the AAO Cataract Preferred Practice Pattern Panel. Dr. Chang is also chair of the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery (ASCRS) Cataract Clinical Committee and will begin his term on the ASCRS Executive Committee in 2009, eventually serving as President. He was co-chief medical editor of Cataract and Refractive Surgery Today for five years. In 2006, Dr. Chang became only the third ophthalmologist to ever receive the Charlotte Baer Award honoring the outstanding clinical faculty member at the UCSF Medical School. He was the third recipient of the Strampelli Medal from the Italian Ophthalmological Society (2007). In 2009, he delivered both the Binkhorst Lecture and the Lim Lecture (two of the most prestigious international awards for cataract surgery).

Dr. Dick Litwin trained at the University of California San Francisco and currently runs a private ophthalmology practice in Berkeley, California. Dr. Litwin has dedicated his career and life to improving eye care in the world. He has taught cataract surgery in Asia for more than 30 years. In the 1980’s he worked to help establish the Aravind Eye Institute in India, one of the finest eye care facilities in the developing world. He was the first person in Nepal to perform cataract surgery using a lens implant. He has been working with Dr. Ruit since 1985. Dr. Litwin is a pioneer in the establishment of modern eye care in India, Nepal and in other countries in which Tilganga and the Himalayan Cataract Project operate.

Over his medical career, Professor Dan Reinstein has built an international reputation as a uniquely experienced and pioneering LASIK surgeon. His particular expertise in LASIK research and the systematization of surgical technique are key assets for his work with HCP. 

Professor Reinstein graduated from Cambridge University, and did his ophthalmology training at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. During several years of research in ultrasound bioengineering at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University he led the development of the Artemis VHF digital ultrasound technology -  the most accurate diagnostic technology for measuring and studying the individual corneal layers as well as ocular dimensions of the anterior segment with one micron precision. Professor Reinstein has pioneered the application of the Artemis technology to the understanding of LASIK safety and accuracy, and is recognized as one of the leading authorities in the repair of the complications of LASIK. He developed Laser Blended Vision - the LASIK treatment for presbyopia (ageing eyes) now distributed as by Carl Zeiss in their MEL80 laser platform. Professor Reinstein has also developed new algorithms for the safe treatment of very high refractive error by LASIK. He brings exceptional expertise and experience accrued as the former Chief Medical Officer of a group of clinics across North America in which high standards of care and surgical systematization enabled over 100,000 procedures to be performed in one year by 58 surgeons in 28 clinics.

Concurrently with his medical career Professor Reinstein has been playing the saxophone for over 40 years including two years of study on a performance scholarship at the Berkley College of Music, Boston, and he is continuing to play jazz on a regular basis.

He is the founder and Medical Director of the London Vision Clinic where he practices full-time. For additional information on Professor Reinstein and his work please visit London Vision Clinic.

Michael Wiedman, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School Surgeon, Massachusetts General Hospital, Director, Massachusetts Eye lnfirmary.  Dr. Mike Wiedman was a family doctor in Appalachia and subsequently trained in ophthalmology at Harvard and in Manhattan Eye Hospital. His continuing special interest is Sports Medicine and he had been team physician for five Mount Everest Expeditions.  Altitude Illness is his particular research and he has published six relevant papers with co-director Geoffrey Tabin, among other works. Dr. Wiedman has operated and taught ocular, plastic, and general surgery in Bhutan, Nepal and China. He is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. Parenthetically, he has had Museum and gallery, Mountain and Cultural Photography Exhibitions in Paris, Boston and New York and is a published poet. Dr. Mike is a Fellow of both the Explorers Club and the Royal Geographical Society.