The procedure known as Lasik Eye Surgery was developed and patented by the ophthalmologist Dr. Patricia Bath, who was born in Harlem in 1942.
Bath was the first African American woman doctor to receive a patent for a medical purpose and was also the founder of the American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness in Washington D.C.
Bath was born in Harlem on November 4, 1942, Bath – the daughter of Rupert and Gladys Bath. Her father, an immigrant from Trinidad, was a newspaper columnist, a merchant seaman and the first black man to work for the New York City Subway as a motorman.
Raised in Harlem, Bath was encouraged academically by her parents. She received her Bachelor of Arts in chemistry from New York’s Hunter College in 1964. She relocated to Washington, D.C. to attend Howard University College of Medicine, from which she received her doctoral degree in 1968. During her time at Howard, she was president of the Student National Medical Association and received fellowships from the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Mental Health. Bath interned at Harlem Hospital Center, subsequently serving as a fellow at Columbia University.
While working as a fellow at Columbia, she persuaded her professors to operate on blind patients at Harlem Hospital Center, which had not previously offered eye surgery, at no cost. Bath pioneered the worldwide discipline of “community ophthalmology”, a volunteer-based outreach to bring necessary eye care to underserved populations. She served her residency in ophthalmology at New York University from 1970 to 1973, the first African American to do so in her field.
Bath holds four patents in the United States. In 1981, she conceived of the Laserphaco Probe, a medical device that improves on the use of lasers to remove cataracts, and “for ablating and removing cataract lenses”. The device was completed in 1986 after Bath conducted research on lasers in Berlin and patented in 1988 making her the first African American female doctor to receive a patent for a medical purpose.
The device — which quickly and nearly painlessly dissolves the cataract with a laser, irrigates and cleans the eye and permits the easy insertion of a new lens — is used internationally to treat the disease. Bath has continued to improve the device and has successfully restored vision to people who have been unable to see for decades.
Three of Bath’s four patents relate to the Laserphaco Probe.In 2000, she was granted a patent for a method she devised for using ultrasound technology to treat cataracts.
Dr. Bath’s patents were donated to her Alma Mata, Howard University, and now work towards building the university’s endowment every time someone gets the procedure.
Learn more about this amazing Harlemite here:
Laying the Cornerstone of Harlem Hospital – 1957
