Serious Complaints regarding the LMU Eye Clinic

Schwerwiegende Beschwerden bezüglich der Augenklinik der LMU

Augenklinik der Universität München

PUBLIC WARNING:

At first appearances, Munich University's Ophtalmology department, which runs the eye clinic, seems to be a well equiped and busy medical practice, however, the number of complaints by patients registered on Google alone, and the nature of those complaints, raises great concern.

Of 284 reviews over 190 are complaints about the service and treatment, ranging from annoyance at long delays and rudeness, to serious malpractice.

One reviewer states "Never go there. Better pop your eye out with a kitchen knife, you’ll be doing yourself a favor."

another writes "An obviously overloaded emergency room. Unfortunately, I have not been told consistently about available doctors and I have to wait a long time, so I'm in another practice."

The list is endless, including a complaint that Dr Wolf mislead a patient, performing an uncessary operation which left him partially blind in one eye. 

Case study: We have decided to investigate some of the more serious complaints, one from a British man visiting a friend in Munich, an ex Lufthansa pilot who had a good opinion of the LMU.  The man had a minor problem with his right eye due to mild inflamation in the periphery of his retina that was causing a tiny patch of darkness in his extreme left-top peripheral vision in the evenings, but that cleared up by morning. His vision was still better than 2020 with correction in both eyes, with -3.75 dipoters, and he could focus in all ranges. He had previously been to optometrists regarding this problem, but they had been unable to find any problems.

Following his friend's recomendation, he decided to visit the clinic, and after a 4 hours wait, was revised by a junior ophtamologist who had difficulty locating the problem area.  The patient, having had the same problem earlier with optometrists, suggested that they use an indirect binocular ophtamoloscope, which allowed them to see the extreme peripher area of his retina, where they finally found a slight puckering in the retina.

The patient was refered to Dr Armin Wolf, who advised the patient that an immediate operation was necessary or the patient could lose his sight.  He asked the patient if he wanted a scleral buckle or a vitrectomy, to which the surprised patient replied, "how should I chose?".

Dr Wolf then said, reportedly with some impatience "I don't have time, I will perform the vitrectomy because otherwise I cannot be sure of a good result.", and that many patients were waiting so there was not time for further discussion. Having read while waiting that vitrectomies can lead to cataract development, the patient then asked Dr Wolf's view, and was told by Dr Wolf that "we have not seen a cataract develop here following many years of operations".

Given the advice that he could lose his vision, he decided to trust Dr Wolf, and the following morning had been preped for the operation, when suddenly the accounts manager of the LMU entered his room requesting €4,000 in cash or they could not operate, as the patients medical insurance from the UK could not be confirmed in time.  This was then paid, and the operation proceeded.

Following the operation the eye was badly swollen and bloody, and when Dr Wolf visited the patient he apologised that they had not found that there was inflamation, uveitis, until after they had removed the vitreous gel from his eye, and that what was needed was a single treatment of corticosteroids. Dr Wolf immediately walked away without further comment.

After 3 weeks with no vision in the operated eye due to the gas that had been injected at LMU, the sight cleared, but the myopia had increased by -3 dipoters to -7, with considerable double vision. In the following months the mypoia increased to -12 with all clarity of vision lost, and a level of myopia that cannot be correctd by glasses.

During this period the patient attempted to ask the Clinic what had happened and what could be done, however both Dr Wolf and Dr Priglinger refused to comment, and stopped replying to correspondence.

The patient had to ask a lawyer for help to obtain his medical files, but after 6 weeks without a response from the LMU, the lawyer had to threaten legal action against the LMU Eye Clinic.

The response from LMU was an invoice for copy costs, which was promptly paid, however only the briefest of documents were sent, there was no medical overview, and the copy of the video of the operation was denied by LMU.

As the LMU Eye Clinic is part of Munich University, we have concerns that student doctors may be practicing on patients, something that with the refusal to supply the video of the operation, we cannot at this point confirm.

In numerous complaints made against the LMU Eye Clinic, patients state that the clinic refuses to give out information in written format, and we suspect that this is for legal reasons to protect the clinic from malpractice cases.

Opinion of the CPD:

Clearly given so many complaints against a medical facility, something is seriously wrong.

With many complaints of hours of delays in the emergency unit, it is clear that the LMU is overloaded, and that can lead to mistakes.

Worst of all are the reports of misinformation being given to patients by Dr Wolf, that the clinic refuses or delays requests by patients for copies of their files, and that when pressed by patient's lawyers, this clinic sends less than the expected minimum of information, including ignoring requests for copies of the mandatory video made during operations.  We are concerned that patients may be being used for training of student surgeons, and are attempting to verify this with the authorities.

We do not advise the public to visit this clinic unless there is absolutely no alternative.

Our investigations are ongoing and we will publish more details shortly.

We DEMAND that the German Medical Board investigate these complaints against the LMU Eye Clinic with upmost urgency.

If you also have a complaint against the LMU please contact us.

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Last modified: December 31, 2019