A Florida native, Dr. Shoemaker gained early admission to medical school and received combined B.S. and M.D. degrees from the University of Florida. Accepted without the usual requirement of an internship, he then completed his residency in Ophthalmology at the Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans. In 1983, Dr. Shoemaker founded Center for Sight, which is now acclaimed as one of the country’s finest eye care facilities.
Dr. Shoemaker is a “super specialist,” a doctor who devotes his entire practice to one discipline, in this case, cataract and lens replacement surgery. Dr. Shoemaker is singularly focused on delivering unsurpassed results and consequent to that commitment, he has performed over 100,000 cataract procedures, resulting in Center For Sight being ranked #1 in the U.S. for advanced lens surgery.
Dr. Shoemaker is board-certified by both the American Board of Ophthalmology and the American Board of Eye Surgery and is consistently honored as one of America’s “Top Doctors” by Castle Connolly Medical. He has been named a “Top Doctor” by U.S. News and World Report and is included on the Premier Surgeon 300, a list of the most influential eye surgeons in the United States. He was recently honored with the “Compassionate Doctor Award” due to the patient reviews he received on Vitals.com. Locally, Dr. Shoemaker was voted “Best Ophthalmologist” and received the “Greater Good” Award for his leadership of Mission Cataract, Center For Sight’s annual charitable event. In 2012, Dr. Shoemaker established the Center For Sight Foundation in order to continue his 30 year commitment of providing sight-saving surgeries to people with no means to pay through Mission Cataract. The Center For Sight Foundation provides over 100 free sight-saving cataract surgeries each year.
In addition to his leadership at Center For Sight, in 2019, Dr. Shoemaker founded US Eye, a management organization developed to expand the Center For Sight vertical delivery model across the nation. The mission of US Eye is to become the most admired brand in eye care. With Center For Sight at the organization’s core, the company has a strong foundation for growth and name recognition that speaks for itself. Through Center For Sight and now US Eye, Dr. Shoemaker continues to pave the way in the eye care industry — his lifelong passion.
Dr. Shoemaker is married with two grown children and a new addition, also named David. He and his wife, Yara, make their home in Sarasota, where he enjoys his favorite pastimes of reading, traveling and chasing an amazing six year old everywhere he goes.
Location served: Sarasota
