Ronald N Gaster, MD

Ronald N. Gaster, MD, FACS, is a board-certified, fellowship-trained ophthalmologist in private practice in Fountain Valley and Beverly Hills, California, and clinical professor of ophthalmology at the Jules Stein Eye Institute, UCLA School of Medicine; and at the Gavin Herbert Eye Institute, University of California, Irvine. He is on staff at Long Beach Medical Center, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles and the University of California, Irvine Medical Center.

Dr. Gaster has been selected by his peers to Best Doctors in America since 1996, U.S. News & World Report's Top Doctors, Los Angeles Magazine's SuperDoctors, and other honors and awards including the American Academy of Ophthalmology Achievement and Honor Awards and was nominated as Clinician of the Year at UC Irvine Medical Center. Dr. Gaster is a past president of the Orange County Society of Ophthalmology. He is a graduate of Cornell University, UCLA School of Medicine, The University of Chicago and Manhattan Eye, Ear, and Throat Hospital, where he was a fellow in Corneal and Refractive Surgery.

Most recently, Dr. Gaster appeared as an expert and guest doctor on the national, Emmy award winning television show, The Doctors. He performed corneal cross-linking and corneal transplant surgery for the show and will be making additional appearances.

Dr. Gaster was one of the first 20 corneal surgeons internationally to perform femtosecond laser-assisted penetrating keratoplasty and has continued research in that field. He additionally uses the femtosecond laser for cataract surgery and other advanced corneal techniques, such as LASIK and SMILE (SMall Incision Lenticule Extraction). Dr. Gaster was also a pioneer in the field of refractive surgery and a principal investigator for the excimer laser. He is now studying and performing corneal cross-linking in adults and adolescents to halt progression of keratoconus and other ectatic diseases and is a principal investigator for that study. He has about 100 peer reviewed journal publications, abstracts and book chapters, including most recently in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, Cornea and Ophthalmology. He recently was a guest editor for the International Ophthalmology Clinics. Dr. Gaster also enjoys going on medical missions and has taught corneal surgery in Africa, China, South America, India and Nepal.