Optometrist life in Canada is great??

[Hero]

What can you tell me about an optometrist life in Canada that may help me decide whether emigration is a good idea or not. Is it worth making the move. I've got a good employed optom job in UK that is close to home. Why should it be better in Canada
Is the winter weather really awful in Toronto?
I am an employed optom and have to work daily like I am on a conveyor belt, rushing through tests every 20mins and running behind all day, "walk-in" customers/patients being squeezed in between existing appointments, missing lunch braek because too many people have been walk-ins have been squeezed in and so on...?:(
I recently saw a job advertised in St Johns Canada saying 20 min testing is required. So one tell me life as an optometrist is great in Canada and not rush rush rush.:(
I know some of you optoms in Canada will hate the idea of immigrant optoms stealing your jobs and deliberately want to tell me how horrible optom life is - just to keep me away .
Please don't. I'm a nice person. Thankyou:) :) :) :)

[Caddy]

It's great here for optoms. Optom's take all the money away from the opticians!!

Jus kiddin

[eyedoctor]

Here's the reply I posted on your UK board Hero...

http://theoptom.com/viewtopic.php?t=2097

Kamy :)

[optometrist2020]

Hello,

It really depends on where you locate in Canada. If you do not mind being in a more rural area then you will be able to find a great job that fits your needs. If you are thinking of locating in Toronto, it is harder because there is more competition for the "better" jobs. Plus, when the new graduates look for jobs around May, they often want those "better" jobs where you can spend more time with patients, have some pretesting, have a dispensing office and get paid fairly. Now, if you are not able to get one of these types of jobs, often people end up working at a "side-by-side" which means you are the optometrist beside an optical store. Here you will get 100% of your exam fees and may have some control over the hours that work, but there is some unspoken/spoken pressure to help the optical otherwise they will not like you. I would say, do not be afraid of doing a 20 minute exam if you have proper pretesting in place (ie Visual field screen, autorefraction, NCT, etc.) This saves you a lot of time from collecting this information yourself. Plus, if you work at a location that does a good job of dispensing, your counselling of the patient in your exam room can be minimal. I can't say if things are better here than in the UK. I was in London, UK for a few days in July and I didn't like it very much. There was a lot of pollution and things are so expensive. In Canada you would have more opportunity to be close to nature and housing is more affordable (except in Vancouver and Alberta). Good luck!