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IT'S A CHALLENGE I LIKE

As a young boy growing up in Macon, Mississippi, John McVey spent hours on end tinkering. He loved to build and fix things, and particularly, small things and small parts. He found joy in the tinkering and success in the ability to make things work. Now, Dr. John McVey, is still tinkering but in a very specialized way, helping his pediatric ophthalmology patients improve their quality of eyesight.

"I didn't have any idea at the time that ophthalmology is what I would do. But, as it turns out, it really fits my personality. I can sit and tinker for a long time and never grow tired or give up. I'm insistent and very persistent. Tinkering was fun when I was a child and it's still fun to me, that's a challenge I like," Dr. McVey explains.

Dr. McVey started his college career at Mississippi State but transferred and graduated from Ole Miss. He headed to the University of Mississippi Medical Center for medical school and ophthalmology training. Dr. McVey received specialty training for a year in Los Angeles for pediatric ophthalmology and later received specialized training for a year in Salt Lake City practicing ocular plastic surgery.

"It's nice to fix somebody's problem, it gives the patient relief and it's satisfying for me to know I've helped make their life better," voices Dr. McVey. "When something's broken, I want to fix it. We do a lot of procedures that are rather mechanical. We fix it and make it look like it's supposed to and work like it's supposed to. That's a big deal."

Dr. McVey shares, "We have a broad number of sub-specialists here at JEA. We can interchange patients within our physicians depending on what the patients' problems are. And we can do that fairly seamlessly. If you see a patient one day and need another physician to consult, you can go straight to their office and have them come look at your patient or you can take the patient to them. We take care of problems efficiently. Nothing's perfect, but we have a pretty good system to serve our patients."

When Dr. McVey is away from the office you might find him writing an essay or playing a round of golf.

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