The letters came from a young ophthalmologist in Kentucky. He was recruiting for an eye doctors’ rebellion.
“We won’t be trod upon,” he wrote, using the language of 1776. “You can’t promulgate injustice without consequences.”
The injustice he was talking about was a new rule, from the powerful group that deems American ophthalmologists to be “board-certified.” It required younger doctors to take a test that older doctors did not have to take.
The Kentucky doctor was so outraged that he seceded — and started his own Board of Ophthalmology, so he could certify himself.
“You can send a clear message to the establishment” by signing up to be certified by the new board, too, the letter said. “Check the appropriate box and return the card with your $500. Sincerely, Rand Paul, M.D.”
The letter, from about 2003, helps illuminate a little-understood chapter of Paul’s life before politics: how he became a self-certified ophthalmologist.
His do-it-yourself medical board lasted more than a decade, becoming one of the most complex organizations Paul ever led on his own. But it didn’t work. Indeed, in a life of successes, it became one of Paul’s biggest flops.
The board certified only 50 or 60 doctors, by Paul’s count, and was never accepted by the medical establishment. It failed partly because of resistance from the old guard — but also because Paul hurt his own cause with shortcuts and oversights that made his big effort seem small.
“It was a good idea,” said Tim Conrad, an ophthalmologist in Louisville, who paid to be certified by Paul’s National Board of Ophthalmology. “It fell on its face. But I liked the idea.”
Paul spent 17 years as an eye doctor in Bowling Green, Ky. He still has a license to practice in Kentucky and does free surgeries at home and abroad. He declined to be interviewed for this report.
