Our Eye Doctors

​​​​​Dr. Joy Bate is an award winning optometrist that is excited to serve her community. She earned her B.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering from Tulane University in 1998, a Doctor of Optometry from University of Houston College of Optometry, where she graduated Magna Cum Laude in 2003, and a Doctorate of Philosophy in Physiological Optics from University of Houston College of Optometry in 2006. She is also a Certified Optometric Glaucoma Specialist and is qualified to prescribe therapeutic pharmaceuticals. Dr. Bate specializes in diagnosing and treating Binocular Vision Dysfunction, having received training from Dr. Debby Feinberg, the Founder of NeuroVisual Medicine, at the renowned NeuroVisual Medicine Institute in Michigan.

Dr. Joy Bate’s specialties include contact lenses and glasses, ocular disease management including diabetes mellitus, age related macular degeneration, glaucoma, eye infections, and foreign body removal from the front surface of the eye. She also provides multiple treatment plans for those needing treatment for dry eyes or Sjogren’s related dry eye disease.

Dr. Bate is experienced in specialty contact lens treatments including, soft and hard contact lenses, ortho-K, RGP, keratoconus contact lens fittings, and scleral lenses. She has been a public speaker for Johnson and Johnson Acuvue contact lenses and published in Multifocal contact lens research.

She can provide ortho-K treatment which allows one to not have to wear contacts or glasses during the day and you wear an ortho-K lens that acts as a retainer for your eyes while you sleep. This often halts the increases in nearsightedness and stabilizes the patient’s vision with little changes in vision over time.

Dr. Bate also provides myopia management care. Myopia management can slow down the increase in children’s nearsightedness as they grow older through a thorough treatment plan with specialized contacts for myopia control, ortho-K, specialty-designed eye glass lenses, or therapeutic eye drops.

She has also performed research in the areas of multifocal contact lens research and adaptive optics retinal imaging, as well as developing a way to measure blood flow non invasively to help further glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy research using an adaptive optics scanning laser ophthalmoscope at the University of Houston and University of California at Berkeley. Dr. Bate has been in practice since 2003, and she is a proud Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry, and a member of FAAO, Texas Optometric Association, and American Optometric Association. Her numerous awards include the American Optometric Foundation/Cooper Vision Innovative Research Award and the American Academy of Optometry Julius F. Neumueller Award in Optics. Dr. Bate grew up near Rhome, Tx, in a small Texas Town. She was active in music and played the French horn in Northwest High School bands and at Tulane university bands, and participated in Drum Corps and traveled one year with Sky Ryders Drum and Bugle Corps.

Dr. Joy Bate has always had an interest in medicine and science, and Optometry is a field where one can help many patients see better and have better ocular health. She says that vision is one of the most important senses and optometrists play an important role in helping patients keep the healthy vision. When asked for some of her favorite patient stories, Dr. Bate relates, “I remember a time when a patient of mine came back to me and told me that I had detected ocular cancer and that it had not metastasized and that I had saved her life by insisting she has a dilated eye exam. I also remember a young girl telling her mom she could see her mom’s eyelashes when she put her contact lenses on that was much stronger than other doctors had prescribed for her in the past and she said this is the best I have ever seen.”

In her spare time, Dr. Bate loves to travel with her husband, who is a pilot for American Airlines, and their son and daughter. She loves going to the beach, flying with her family in their small airplane, traveling with her children, walking her 2 dogs, gardening, reading, sewing, and quilting.

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Dr. Elizabeth Ortega earned her Bachelor of Arts in Biology from the University of St. Thomas(Houston) before completing her Doctor of Optometry degree at the University of Houston College of Optometry(UHCO) in May 2023. During her clinical training at UHCO, she completed externships at Sharp Eye in San Antonio, Cedar Springs Eye Clinic in Dallas, and Heights Community Clinic in Houston. These rotations provided her with extensive experience in primary eye care, contact lenses, dry eye management, diabetic eye exams, cataract care, and both pre- and post-operative evaluations for LASIK and cataract surgeries.

She also completed a rotation through UHCO’s SNAPS (Special Needs Adults and Pediatric Services), where she provided care for patients with autism, Down syndrome, and other special needs—a population she continues to be passionate about serving. Dr. Ortega is committed to building long-term relationships with her patients and believes in delivering compassionate, personalized eye care to every individual.

A native Spanish speaker, Dr. Ortega is proud to serve diverse communities and ensure language is never a barrier to quality care. In her free time, Dr. Ortega enjoys traveling and exploring new cuisines with her husband and their beloved rescue dog, Luna.