Submitted Community News
Dr. Elizabeth Kilgore and Dr. Hayden Sowers have assumed ownership of Progressive Eye Center in Cherokee Village following the retirement of longtime owner Dr. Jerry Ellis.
Progressive Eye Center has provided eye care in north-central Arkansas since 1993. Ellis has served as the practice’s sole owner since 2003, developing the practice and providing eye care to patients throughout the region.
Kilgore began working at Progressive Eye Center in 2010, providing optometric care at its Piggott and Cherokee Village locations. She remained with the practice until 2021, when she relocated to northeast Arkansas to be closer to family.
Her return to Progressive Eye Center brings her back to a community and practice where she spent more than a decade of her career.
Kilgore is partnering with Sowers, owner of White River Eye Care in Batesville. The two have worked together providing eye care to patients in Batesville and surrounding communities.
Under their ownership, Progressive Eye Center will continue to offer comprehensive eye examinations and the treatment and management of a variety of eye conditions. Services include diabetic eye exams, glaucoma and macular degeneration management, contact lens fittings, dry eye treatment, and designer eyewear and lenses.
The practice also offers specialty scleral contact lenses for patients with complex vision needs and dry eye treatments including red light therapy and intense pulsed light, or IPL.
Direct selective laser trabeculoplasty, or DSLT, is also available as a treatment option for glaucoma.
Kilgore and Sowers said they plan to maintain the patient relationships established under Ellis while continuing to expand treatment options and technology available through the practice.
The ownership transition marks Ellis’ retirement from the practice and Kilgore’s return to Progressive Eye Center after five years away.
