Filed under: Business,Health,Medicine

A popular Beverly Hills eye surgeon, who has a great hand on the new Lasek eye surgery procedure. Every satisfied patient he treats, he gives them a video of their surgery to watch at home. The hope here is, that his patients will be so pleased with the way their eyesight turned out, that they would use the video they get, to post on the Internet with a great review of the doctor’s abilities. And if they do this, they get a bonus – either a discount on the eye surgery that costs thousands of dollars, or a free cosmetic procedure of their choice. Does it seem unseemly that respected surgeons would stoop to begging for free publicity, or worse, paying for it?

This is the brave new world where even a serious and respectable eye surgeon has to go about barking for patients “Step right up!” In fact, this is been done for quite a while – doctors and surgeons have long recruited patients for their testimonials, sometimes they go on TV on infomercials too. However, most professional surgeons’ bodies will prohibit them from actually paying for those testimonials. But now, it is clear that while actual cash doesn’t change hands, plenty of discounts and freebies actually do.