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It sounds like the author studied medicine in German.

In German, "ophthalmologist" is "Augenarzt", which is literally "eye doctor" (Auge: "eye" + Ärztin: "doctor").

Why replace a good, short and clear word with a bad and long word that adds no information, but fewer people will understand? [Edit: I think I'm wrong about the adding no information, depending on country there might be other types of eye doctors than ophthalmologists]

Come on, it was only a (good?) old joke ...

Haha! Good point. I guess I thought "eye doctor" made for easier reading, assuming not everyone knows that ophthalmologist == eye doctor.

The way I typically like to use terms of art in writing is to write the term out first, and then a parenthetical with a definition. For example here you went to see an ophthalmologist (eye doctor). It's also good for acronyms and initialisms.