MD, FEBOphth. Physician CEO.
Erik L. Mertens, MD, FEBOphth currently serves as the Director and Ophthalmic Surgeon of the Medipolis Eye Center in Belgium.
Dr. Mertens graduated form the University of Antwerp in 1991. He then followed his residency in ophthalmology from 1991-1995 studying refractive surgery, wavefront aberration laser surgery, phakic IOL, cataract surgery, cornea transplant and presbyopia reversal.
He founded a new multidisciplinary clinic named 'Medipolis Private Antwerp Clinic’ in 2009 (Antwerp, Belgium). Medipolis is the only ophthalmogical center in Belgium which obtained the rigorous KIWA certificate.
He graduated from the Kellogg School of Management, Evanston, USA as Physician CEO in October 2015.
Dr. Mertens has utilized his expertise to become a specialist in the fields of refractive surgery as well as small incision cataract surgery. His extensive refractive surgery experience has led him to be the author of over 400 abstracts in national and international congresses and make over 600 scientific presentations both nationally and internationally.
Dr. Mertens is chief medical editor for the Journal of Cataract & Refractive Surgery Today. He also serves as an International Editorial Board Member of the Journal of Refractive Surgery and ‘World Journal of Ophthalmology’. He is a scientific reviewer for the ‘Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery’, the ‘American Journal of Ophthalmology’ and the ‘Journal of
Refractive Surgery’.
Dr. Mertens is a member of a variety of societies including a Fellow of the European Board of Ophthalmology (FEBO), a member of the European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery (ESCRS), the International Society of Refractive Surgery (ISRS), and an International Member of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and co-founder of AECOS (American-European college of Ophthalmic Surgeons) and president AECOS Europe (2019-2021). He is a member of the prestigious International Intra-Ocular Implant Club and of the board of ‘Refractive Surgery Alliance’. He also performs live surgery at national and international congresses.
He is a consultant to STAAR Surgical, PhysIOL, Ellex, Allotex, Ophtec, Hoya, Zeiss, Tearlab, Medicontur, MST, Excel-Lens and Optovue. He is the lead instructor and moderator of several courses on premium IOL and phakic IOL implantation. He performed the first femtosecond laser cataract surgery in Belgium in September 2012 and in total more than 5000 FLACS cases. He received the ‘ASCRS film festival award’ for the best video in the field of refractive surgery at the 2004 Symposium of the ‘American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery’ and was the ‘2005 Arthur Culler Memorial Lecturer’ at the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
He recently received the price at OB 2019 for ‘best rapid fire presentation’ during the Belgian Ophthalmology Congress (Early clinical experience with a new Selective Laser Capsulotomy (SLC) device). He implanted the first worldwide commercially available Visian EVO VIVA ICL in October 2020.