the new contact lens law

[dannyboy12]

At our office, we are getting more and more selfpay patients that are in for contact lens fittings. All of them had been purchasing their lenses from 1 800 contacts. It seems that they are actually making sure the Rx is not expired. Also we are noticing too that many patients that we thought had tranferred because they never came back that they were getting their lenses refilled there some for almost 4 years. We had no idea....maybe this law isnt that bad after all.

It will be interesting what the contact lens rule that the FTC is currently working on will say about contact lens fitting opticians.
I am saying that because it sounds according to other folks that I know that are licensed opticians and that do contact lenses, that they are now required to provide the prescription as well.

The big questions is if Opticians in Conneticut, NY, Fla, MA, Ohio, Virginia, Washington etc fit contact lenses what is the prescription that we used called from the MD/OD since it is not a contact lens prescription as defined by the new law. Also do we in turn become precribers as we are the ones that determined the parameters of the lenses? We wanted a level field with the Ods and Mds but us having to provide the parameters to others seems like a bit much....


Dannyboy

[Cowboy]

DannyBoy,

Unfortunatly, I do not have the luxury of being able to provide "legal Rx's" as my conservative grass-root state can't seem to get its head out of its *** to license us opticians, oh but they sure do take our cash for a useless "dispensing registration", but enough about that. In regards to your question of the new law; LDO, OD, MD, if you RX it you provide it. No questions asked. You are actually suppose to simply hand them the rx without them asking for it.
How to get around this, charge the same price as 1-800-contacts, provide or at least try to convince getting a year supply, and don't worry about profit on CL's - there isn't any (anymore)! Instead, you make your profit on the fitting time. You should price shop your competitors to see how much they charge for fittings and put yourself in the middle. This way you get to keep your clients, they don't shop around and you most likely see them next year.

Hope I was help

Cowboy:cheers:

[hcjilson]

Dannyboy,
Nice to see your first post!
If the optician fits CL's from an original (Spectacle) Rx from an OD or MD, he/she does so by overrefracting.However, the parameters from this fitting belong to the individual who was fit, after all, they paid for them. Why shouldn't they be given to the wearer ? Isn't that was "Prescription Release" all about?

I always shy away from talking about overrefraction so as not to open old wounds from my optometric friends....at least in Massachusetts anyway. (Back in 1965 the then Atty General Ed Brooke said that overrefraction constituted the practice of Optometry......and lost after a 8 year court battle) It will indeed be interesting to see what the FTC will say about that. I hope we (Opticians) don't get blown back into the stone age!

One of the things that COULD and SHOUD have happened (Mandatory Education for opticians) did not. Currently the MA board of Registration is addressing that problem in their new rules and regs.

Education is the key to our future!