Discount Contact Lenses - wear contacts? Your prescription's good to go.

After getting an eye exam, James Montgomery asked his optometrist for his prescription so he could buy his contact lenses from a mail-order supplier at a lower price. 

The optometrist balked. But Montgomery kept insisting. Finally, he was given a copy. 

"It really upset me when they said my prescription didn't belong to me," Montgomery said. 

A federal law that takes effect Feb. 4 requires optometrists and ophthalmologists to provide a contact lens prescription -- whether or not the patient asks for it. This will give contact wearers the same right to their prescriptions that eyeglass wearers have had for years. 

Many eye doctors sell contact lenses, and this can create a conflict of interest, said Kevin McCaloum of 1-800-CONTACTS, the largest mail-order contact lens supplier. "Are they prescribing the best lens or the most profitable one?" he said. 

Consumers spend $3.5 billion per year on replacement contact lenses. Buying refills from alternative sellers saves, on average, 20 percent per order, according to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. 

With the new law, consumers can compare prices from mail-order suppliers, discount stores such as Wal-Mart and chains such as Pearle Vision and LensCrafters. Consumers Union, the group that publishes Consumer Reports magazine, argues that this "vigorous competition" will lower prices. 

While some optometrists refuse to provide prescriptions, most do provide copies because they don't want to antagonize customers, said Michael Horstman, executive director of the Illinois Optometric Association. 

A prescription has three parts: power (visual correction) base curve (curvature of the eye) and diameter (width of the cornea). 

Under the new law, an eye doctor cannot require a customer to sign a waiver to obtain a prescription. Such waivers typically "have a lot of scary language to make a person think he's doing something wrong," McCaloum said. 

If the prescription calls for an eye doctor's store brand, it must allow substitution of a national brand. 

The state and national optometric associations support the law, which also tightens regulations on contact lens sellers. The law "will not only support consumers' choice of where they buy their contacts, but also specifically prohibit sellers from providing lenses without a valid, verified prescription," said Victor Connors, president of the American Optometric Association.