LaserMyEye Terms of Use (the "Big Print")

D'Eyealogues Supplemental Terms of Use (more "Big Print")

Disclaimer (the "Small Print")

Editor's Note (How we know whether you actually saw and agreed to any or all of the Terms of Use and/or Disclaimer

LaserMyEye Terms of Use (the "Big Print")

IF YOU ARE OR MIGHT BECOME A HUMAN OF ANY DESCRIPTION WHATSOEVER, INCLUDING DOCTORS AND PATIENTS AND INDIVIDUALS CONSIDERING HAVING LASER VISION CORRECTION, by using this website you agree to the following terms:

Editor's note: Please read the following item before turning your mental processor to the channel labelled "Interpret as obligatory legal blather intended to ensure I realise I shouldn't believe anything I read on the internet however plausible it may appear".

WE AIN'T NO DOCTORS: You understand that this site is edited and run by (a) a human being, and (b) a patient, as opposed to a doctor, and (c) an individual who cares about You, whoever you may be, particularly if you have had or may in the future have laser vision correction, which possibility is potentially relevant to most of the human race with imperfect vision and either discretionary income or passable credit as well as some few pigs and rabbits without discretionary income or credit but who by virtue of their human-like corneas have been or will be fortunate enough to participate in experiments designed to provide them with improved uncorrected visual acuity free of charge, and (d) an individual who has acquired a considerable amount of understanding of refractive surgery and its benefits and drawbacks, and (e) an individual who has a visual disability, and (f) in case you haven't realised it we're talking about one person here, not five. And in case you are particularly obtuse, the point here is that for all of the aforementioned reasons you should consider it safe to assume that what is written on this site is neither always right nor always wrong.

Editor's note: OK, you can switch channels now.

YOUR DECISIONS ARE JUST THAT — YOURS. You understand that by virtue of not only common sense but also the reams upon reams of declarations and disclaimers we have made here, there and everywhere, we at LaserMyEye are completely and entirely non-responsible for the consequences of anything you do at any time, generally of course (like whether you get salmonella poisoning from mishandling raw chicken) but more specifically with respect to any decision you may make about having eye surgery of any kind or anything else having to do with the care of your eyes. This means that even if you see us occasionally appearing inclined to pat ourselves on the back by (for example) publishing thank-you letters to the editor sent by individuals who are pleased with the outcome of decisions they made about their eyecare after reading our site, that does NOT constitute credit-taking by ourselves for a right decision made by that individual nor is it an admission by ourselves that if YOU make the wrong decision and suffer any physical, mental, spiritual, financial or other consequences, it could in any way be construed to be our fault, no matter how creative or clever your lawyer is. In fact, nothing you choose to do is our fault because we have never pretended to be qualified to direct or advise you and we have always gone to great lengths to make this clear to you.

WE'RE IN THE INFORMATION BUSINESS, NOT THE ADVICE BUSINESS. You understand that anything you read anywhere on this site is classified as something called "information" - as opposed to advice (medical or otherwise), directions (medical or otherwise), or anything else along those lines - and might be right, wrong, or irrelevant. You further understand that the process of obtaining medical advice and care is generally thought to consist of finding and visiting a qualified doctor and letting him/her actually examine you, and that therefore reading a website written by someone who is most definitely not a doctor and who has never even wanted to examine your eyes, or reading articles on a website which may or may not have been written by doctors, or even electronically conversing with people who appear to be or claim to be doctors on a bulletin board on a website, is very, very, very different and does not qualify as obtaining medical advice, especially because we didn't pretend otherwise.

NO GUARANTEES ABOUT THE OTHER GUY EITHER. You understand that if you come across references to doctors, or articles or statements appearing to have been written or made by doctors, on this site, we cannot guarantee that the doctor in question is qualified or is saying something that is right or even relevant. In fact, we cannot guarantee that s/he is who s/he claims to be or even exists at all, and the only way you can be sure of anything relating to that doctor is if you do your own independent research and/or go meet him/her in person.

NO FRIVOLOUS LAWSUITS PLEASE. You understand that we do not have unlimited resources set aside to deal with wanton wasters of our time and money, and so by using this site you pre-agree not to sue us for damages suffered from "advice" we allegedly provided in any form whatsoever, because, like we already said, this site is here for informational purposes only and is not in the advice-giving business.

WE'RE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OUTCOME FROM SURGERY. You understand that if you get laser vision correction after reading something or even everything on this website, and you are not satisfied with your results, we will be very, very sad for you but your unfortunate experience will not in any way be our fault and you will not be able to sue us for it. We may have given you some information to help you gauge the size of the risks, or better understand the nature of the risks, or even attempt to reduce the risks, in your personal case, but at the end of the day we played no physical role whatsoever in your pre-operative, intra-operative, or post-operative care - we were only there to prod you to ask the right questions of yourself and your vision care providers. Whatever terms you agreed to with your surgeon and/or clinic about the risks are a legal agreement between you and them with which we had, have and will have nothing to do. We do not promote surgery nor do we in any way guarantee your outcome. Furthermore, lawsuits aside, it would be unkind of you to blame us and our feelings would be hurt, because we were just trying to be nice and had no possibility of financial gain whether you did, or did not, proceed with surgery.

LIBEL? WHAT LIBEL? You understand that we endeavour to ensure, to the best of our ability (within reason), that the information on this website is factual and even reasonble and considerate and you understand that we would never willingly or knowingly libel anyone and that if despite our best efforts we accidentally did so we would certainly do our best to rectify any such error as quickly as reasonably possible. Therefore, if you feel that you personally, or an organisation or person with which you are affiliated, has been libelled by us, you are probably wrong, so you agree that you will consider sleeping on it, in case you wake up in the morning and find you were just being hypersensitive; and if that doesn't work, you will write to us nicely so as to give us the opportunity to clear up any misunderstanding before you go ballistic and sic a bloodthirsty overpaid libel lawyer on us poor innocent under-funded do-gooders.

IF ANY OF THESE TERMS OF USE ARE NOT SUFFICIENTLY CLEAR, PLEASE RE-READ SEVERAL TIMES ALOUD, VERY SLOWLY, AND IF THAT DOESN'T WORK PLEASE CONSULT YOUR ATTORNEY. But for goodness' sake, don't use the website without first ensuring that you and/or your attorney understand the Terms of Use.

 

IF YOU ARE OR MIGHT BECOME AN EYE DOCTOR, your use of this website is subject to the following terms, in addition to any terms applicable to all users:

WE AIN'T NO DOCTORS BUT.... THAT DOESN'T MEAN WE'RE STUPID EITHER. You understand that, unlike your good self, we are not among the privileged possessers of medical degrees or credentials. You understand that we do not have any hands-on experience of any sort in the care (pre-operative, intra-operative, or post-operative) of refractive surgery patients; nor do we make a full-time pursuit of researching refractive surgery; and that we fully acknowledge how handicapped we are in these respects. We estimate that under such circumstances and notwithstanding how sincerely we want to provide accurate information to our readership, you are considerably more likely to take exception to statements, hypotheses, explanations, descriptions, or definitions provided by ourselves on this website than you might to statements, hypotheses, explanations, descriptions or definitions provided by your esteemed colleagues and therefore we eagerly anticipate hearing from you often in hopes some of your expertise will rub off on us and enable us to better serve our readers. By using this website, therefore, you acknowledge that we really, really, really want to give the right, right, right information and therefore you agree that if you disagree with something we wrote because it's inaccurate or incomplete or stupid or in some other way just really, really really wrong, wrong, wrong, and particularly if it's more wrong than what some one or other of your colleagues might have been likely to say or write on the same subject, you'll write to us nicely and, if it's something complicated, you'll quote some really good peer-reviewed literature in support of your point of view and, if possible, out of the goodness of your heart, you will even consider allowing yourself to be persuaded to write a guest column on the subject if it's something really interesting to you or us, so that our readers can have the benefit of your expertise - truly, they will appreciate it and so will we.

DON'T BLAME US FOR YOUR PATIENTS ANNOYING BEHAVIOURS. You understand that we are not here to encourage patients to rely more on the internet, or on us, than on their doctor(s) and that, being aware of the dangers, we are doing our best to discourage misuse of internet-based information and instead foster better communications between patients and doctors. You further understand that if a patient prints off voluminous quantities of material from this website that happen to be completely irrelevant to their condition(s) and brings it into your office to bore or torment you with, s/he has not done so with our sanction (and in fact we have specifically asked them to abstain from annoying behaviours of this type) so please don't blame it on us simply because you see LaserMyEye at the top of the page. - Unless, of course, the patient in question is a complications patient and what they have brought for your perusal is simply the checklist we specifically prepared for complications patients (who may be experiencing considerable distress and therefore can particularly benefit from extra efforts at good communication) and which we honestly think is a reasonable list of things for you to discuss with them.

 

IF YOU ARE OR MIGHT BECOME A PATIENT who has had laser vision correction and is unfortunate enough to have experienced complications or adverse effects or anything other than a highly desireable outcome, or are here on behalf of someone who has, and therefore could conceivably visit this site, now or in the past or the future, in an attempt to get information which will help you or someone you know make actual real-life decisions about your eyes, your use of this website is subject to the following special terms in addition to the terms applicable to everybody else:

YOUR EYES = YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. You understand that we are very sorry you are experiencing troubles, and want to help as much as we can, but that the continued wellbeing of your eye health and eyesight actually require more than reading a website, in fact they require your personal continuous employment of initiative, good judgment, common sense, responsibility, and (most of all) appropriate professional medical care, all of which are entirely your personal responsibility and none of which we have any control over or responsibility for. In other words, we're rooting for you all the way but at the end of the day it is up to you to procure the best care you can and to the extent you slap us with a frivolous lawsuit we will only be that much less able to help other patients experiencing the troubles you are experiencing.

EMERGENCY? DIAL 999 (OR 911, OR WHATEVER THE LOCAL EMERGENCY NUMBER IS). You understand that if anything scary is happening with your vision, you need to get on the phone to your eye doctor pronto, and if s/he has not provided an emergency contact number, you should call your local hospital instead and track down an qualified ophthalmologist who can examine you straightaway. You understand that wasting time poking around on the internet (even on this website) under such circumstances is probably not the appropriate course of action. We realise that for anyone other than a qualified ophthalmologist (or optometrist as the case may be) it may not be possible to be perfectly certain as to whether the symptoms which are scary to the patient indicate something catastrophic, serious, of moderate concern, trivial, or even perfectly normal and that is exactly why, should you have any doubt whatsoever as to the seriousness of the condition, you need to give an eye doctor the opportunity to make that determination rather than feeling obliged to make it yourself. Therefore and notwithstanding your kind disinclination to bother your doctor during evenings or weekends, by using this website you agree that you understand you really ought to do it anyway. Better safe than sorry.

AN APPLE A DAY, SURE, BUT SEE THE DOCTOR TOO. You understand that we really, honestly, truly, sincerely want you to develop and maintain (if you haven't already been so fortunate) one or more really good relationships with real live eye doctors who are highly qualified, experienced in areas relevant to your needs, and conscientious and compassionate. Honestly, we are not just saying this: we mean it. We did not set up this site as a shortcut for you to start self-diagnosing (much less self-treating), nor as a means of tormenting your doctor(s) by printout out voluminous quantities of stuff to show him/her. We merely hope that it may be useful by (among other things) helping you to understand things better and helping you to have fruitful discussions with your doctor about your condition(s) and the treatment(s) which might be or become available or applicable to you.

YOUR ERRORS = YOUR PROBLEM, SO DON'T BLAME US. You understand that if you do anything stupid, either deliberately or out of genuine stupidity, like fail to see an eye doctor when you should, or do something to your eye(s) that you shouldn't, or not do something to your eye(s) that you should, that it is not our fault and by reading this site you pre-agree not to sue us for something that can thus be reasonably described as your fault.

DON'T FORGET THE TERMS OF USE. You understand that if you have any predisposition whatsoever to (a) abuse this website by relying on it too much and/or (b) not seek appropriate eyecare and/or (c) sue us for any reason related to your eyecare, you should re-read the previous four paragraphs several times then print them out and pin them on the wall near your computer for convenient reference before using this website.

D'Eyealogues Terms of Use (more "Big Print")

We earnestly wish that an agreement between LaserMyEye and its appointed bulletin board administrator(s) and moderator(s) (hereinafter collectively referred to as “We”, “Us” and, where the context so requires, “Our”) and the registered users of the bulletin board (hereinafter “You” and, where the context so requires, “Your”) could be short, simple and natural, like this:

Agreement #1: (a) In Our administration of the Bulletin Board, We will always endeavour to act rationally and with due consideration for others. (b) In Your participation on the Bulletin Board, You will always endeavour to act rationally and with due consideration for others.

To our infinite regret, We recognise that there are those amongst You who occasionally or habitually fail to adhere to Agreement #1 and/or who are wont to be grievously offended at others' occasional or habitual failures to do so. Those of You to whom the aforesaid “and” applies are, We fear, inclined to be particularly troublesome. Therefore, We are forced to supplement this kind of simple and straightforward understanding by refining and defining the terms at an obscene level of detail, as follows:

Addendum to Agreement #1: Agreement #1 shall be construed to mean, among other things (such as its obvious face value meaning) that You agree You will not create multiple personalities for yourself on the bulletin board via multiple registrations nor will You post on the Bulletin Board anything which could reasonably be described as or reasonably be determined by US to be:

• Likely to be unacceptable to other users due to obscene, racist, sexist or other offensive content
• False or deceptive
• Libelous
• In violation of copyright laws
• Illegal or of a nature which could get You or Us or You and Us sued (if unsure, You will consult Your lawyer)
• Abusive or vicious
• In violation of HIPAA patient privacy guidelines
• Practicing medicine on the Bulletin Board
• Solicitation or promotion of one's products or services or website(s) (with respect to the latter, please send your link for inclusion in our Links Library instead) or
• Wasting copious amounts of Our precious and limited time by giving rise to excessive complaints from other parties and/or the necessity of repeated intervention by Us.

Agreement #2: If in Our estimation You act irrationally and/or without due consideration for others, as described in Agreement #1 as supplemented and modified by the Addendum to Agreement #1, or in some other unacceptable manner so farfetched and bizarre that WE did not explicitly anticipate it in this agreement but cannot rule it out and therefore are forced to add in this clause which anticipates Us using Our judgment lest We or innocent or guilty third parties suffer harm merely through Our having underestimated the extreme depravity of Your imagination, You agree

• We may take any of the following actions which We happen to judge appropriate:
  • Attempt to defuse the situation through dialogue in the forum in which Your offensive behaviour has occurred or is occurring.
  • Send an email or letter to You nicely pointing out Your misbehaviour and inviting You to avoid such behaviour in the future.
  • Delete offensive portions of your post(s) and post an explanation of the action taken and the reasons for it.
  • Suspend Your posting privileges temporarily on the grounds that We have always been told that “time outs” are more effective punishment than spankings.
  • Suspend Your posting privileges permanently. But don't worry, this is as distasteful to us as to you and therefore we will save it for a last resort unless circumstances beyond our control demand otherwise.
• If We have had to take corrective action of any kind, You will re-read Agreement #1(b) and the Addendum to Agreement #1 and reflect upon the facts that:
  • You agreed to this rule prior to participating on the Bulletin Board, therefore
  • You are in violation of the terms of participation of this Bulletin Board, and therefore
  • Your continued participation on this Bulletin Board is wholly and entirely at Our mercy, and therefore
  • if You desire to continue participating, be prepared to be persuasive or penitent, and preferably the latter.
• Your behaviour and attitude may make Us appear to you to be acting irrationally and/or without due consideration for others, in which case You will refer to Agreement #1(a) and/or #3.

User Agreement #3: If We appear to be acting irrationally and/or without due consideration for others in the context of our administration of the Bulletin Board:

1. You will re-read Agreement #1(a) and sleep on it
2. If (1) doesn't help, and You wish to pursue further remedies, You will initiate discussion of the problem on the bulletin board.
3. If (2) doesn't help, and You wish to pursue further remedies, You will email your concern(s) to us at theboss@lasermyeye.org.
4. If (3) doesn't help, and You still wish to pursue further remedies, You will accept the fact that there are no more remedies to pursue and that You are, in fact, Officially Out Of Luck as regards any hope of changing Our decisions and behaviour. We are deeply grieved at Our inability to assauge Your displeasure and hope that any discomfiture You may have experienced is substantially mitigated by the knowledge that You did your best to pursue all the remedies available to You in an orderly manner.

User Agreement #4: You agree that all comments, suggestions, advice, criticisms, exclamations, digressions and remarks of any other nature made by LaserMyEye or by any participating professional (for the avoidance of doubt, including but not limited to ophthalmologists and optometrists) or by any other participant of any kind (even the most unprofessional) on this Bulletin Board, and regardless of whether such remarks are right, wrong, relevant or irrelevant, are given without any liability whatsoever to US. In other words, make no doubt, (a) We're just do-gooders hosting this Bulletin Board as a public service and We don't pretend to know anything let alone everything, and even more importantly, (b) You must not consider anything You read on this Bulletin Board, no matter by whom written, to be medical advice per se because it isn't and if You want medical advice You should do what any rational human being would do which is to search out a properly qualified doctor and visit him/her for a proper examination and proper diagnosis and proper treatment. Any failure of yours to follow these basic steps is in no way Our fault and You agree not to sue us if You or anyone else comes to harm through Your omission, because even if You are not rational or honest enough to understand or admit this on Your own, We are telling you so now and by posting on the bulletin board You are agreeing that You have been told and understand what you were told and therefore you cannot hold Us liable.

User Agreement #5: We are very firm believers in the concept that people should have every opportunity of fully understanding anything they have to sign (or alternatively have to click an “I accept these terms” button for, which is considerably less intimidating) and we wish a pox on everyone, from laser clinics to consumer websites, who has been or will be guilty of lulling You into not thoroughly investigating any forms with fine print to ensure You understand in great detail how they may relate to You personally. Therefore, you agree:

• If You do not understand something in these Terms of Use, You will email us at info@lasermyeye.org for an explanation, and
• You agree You will check the Terms of Use at least once every month while you continue participating, because it is altogether possible they may change over time

Finally, We wish there were an easier way to do this, but hey, it was still easier than reading the Terms of Use on any other website, wasn't it?

Disclaimer (the “Small Print”)

The materials (the "Content") contained on this website are of an educational or informational nature and are not medical advice, diagnosis, or recommendation of medical care. The Content is provided "as is" without warranty of any kind, expressed or implied, with respect to its completeness, accuracy, usefulness, relevance, quality, reliability, currency, or timeliness.

LaserMyEye LLC ("LaserMyEye") assumes that readers will take no steps without consulting qualified, trusted medical professionals. LaserMyEye does not practice medicine or dispense medical advice, care, diagnosis or treatment.

LaserMyEye disclaims and excludes, to the extent permissible by applicable law, all warranties with respect to the Content, expressed or implied.

The Content may contain materials provided by third parties, including but not limited to The Lone Dog and contributing guest columnists. Any opinions or statements made in materials provided by third parties are not the opinions of LaserMyEye and LaserMyEye publishes them without warranty of any kind including accuracy, completeness or relevance.

The LaserMyEye website does not recommend or endorse any ophthalmologist, optometrist, optician, laser vision correction clinic, laser vision correction procedure, or hardware or software used in laser vision correction, or anything else having to do with laser vision correction. It is expected that candidates or patients shall conduct their own independent review before undertaking any treatment or surgery.

The application of these provisions, disclosures and disclaimers arising from the use of this site shall be governed by the laws of the State of Delaware.

Editor's Note (How we know whether you actually saw and agreed to any or all of the Terms of Use and/or Disclaimer)

The long answer:

Well, obviously, we don't, since we neither hijack your machine (we don't even place "cookies" on it) nor stalk you, nor read your mind. But in the unlikely event a situation were to arise in which anybody ever actually cared about it very much (e.g. if you sued us about something relating to the website) there would have to be some better way to decide whether the Terms of Use came into play than merely trying to assess the likelihood that you are lying. The Powers that Be (you know who you are) seem to feel that the salient point would not be whether you had read and agreed to the Terms of Use (since we already admitted we can't prove you did and you know you can't prove you didn't) but rather whether it was reasonable on our part to assume that you had done so (which works just as well for our purposes), based upon our having made the Terms of Use sufficiently accessible to you prior to and during your usage of the site (it being, of course, a reasonable assumption that everyone either always clicks on sufficiently visible Terms of Use links and reads them prior to reading and thinking about and acting on or reacting to any actual contents of a website, or omits to do so in the full knowledge that they are very naughty not to have done so and will in fact be deemed to have done so and therefore they proceed at their own risk exactly as if they had done so). Now, notwithstanding the fact that, if you made it this far, it's already too late for you not to be deemed to have read and agreed to our Terms of Use, we are loath to leave you at the mercy of legal technicalities. Therefore, and entirely out of the generosity of our hearts, we have not only just explained your legal position to you in great detail, but are about to take the further step of articulating a sufficiently explicit interpretation of that position as to purge your mind (and that of your attorney and, probably, any judge and/or jurors in question) of all possible doubt with respect to what actions we ourselves consider, and you (by reading, or by being deemed to have read this) agree to consider, sufficient evidence that you have seen and agreed to the Terms of Use.

Now, please read the following paragraph aloud to yourself very slowly, and if necessary consult your attorney about it before proceeding to read the website:

I agree that if I read (aloud or quietly), skim, furtively glance at, think about, bookmark, click on, forward somebody a link to, print out, take a snapshot of, save to my hard drive, copy to a CD, listen to some reading software's rendition of, feed to a Braille machine, or in any other way visually or aurally or mentally process, or reproduce, or convey to a third party, any page or any part thereof or any link thereto, of this website (excepting of course the page on which the Terms of Use appears, or the link to it from any other page, because that would be circular and unfair), I thereby agree that I have seen and agreed to the Terms of Use of this website, the reasonableness of which policy is attested to by the facts that (a) in substance (if not in form) it really isn't much different from what any other website established for a similar purpose might be likely to say in their Terms of Use, or what I think they might say if I don't usually read them, and (b) there is a big, obvious link to the Terms of Use page in a prominent position that I didn't even have to scroll down to see, and that not only on the home page but in the frameset of every page on this website!

The short answer:

It doesn't matter whether you did or not because you still did. (In the eyes of the law, that is, which is all that matters here, because companies only make Terms of Use pages for legal reasons anyway.) If you disagree, please either go away and don't come back to this website, or consult your attorney about whether it would be prudent for you to read this website subject to these terms.