What's the description of a good optician?

[Clive Noble]

I once heard that an optician (or more correctly an optometrist) who can admit to having made a mistake, is a good one.

I have my own description, and that is to know when you have been beaten by a patient.

Yesterday, I was beaten!!

So the story goes like this, a very jovial gentleman in his 60s, comes through the door. His Hebrew was almost non existent, English...just the odd word... I tried my smattering of French.... negative...... his language was Russian and the use of his hands and lots of laughter and noise, and the glorious sight of gold mishapen teeth added greatly to the happy scene.

Perched high up on his nose was a pair of glasses, a plastics frame from the 70s with a pair of S/V glass lenticulars (-12.00 he wrote for me).

The frame was broken at the bridge and had been fixed with pins and glue and was very wobbly. Both temples were cracked in many places and green gunge was oozing out of every crack......... (that's putting it nicely)

His request was that after 30 years, he would like the lenses transferred to a new frame exact as old. He has not had an eye examination since these were made

I suggested we give him a refraction and see what his Rx is today, then make him a new pair of specs with Full Field 1.71 and AR into a nice modern frame.

No. he sees very well, and just thinks the time might have come to have a new frame. It is his only pair of glasses and these were very expensive lenses.

Before starting anything I checked the CTs.... 0.6mm in the centre.
I managed to do this without touching the frame, just holding the temple with a tissue

Warning bells were ringing in my head. I took approx "a" and "b" measurements.... but was terrified to heat the frame and remove a lens.
I've been down this road before

I told him to wait while I went upstairs to visit our many junk boxes of elderly retired models and after 15 minutes of sifting through, came down with a couple of frames that were possible, but his lenses would need some hand edging and finishing.... again, I wan't too happy about putting these lenses anywhere near a diamond wheel.

Fortunately he didn't like the frames, no he wanted the original Russian made frame. He told me it was one of the modern types, a special frame with pinless front and side joints... he was right, I remember in the late 60s when these were introduced by OBE.

I apologised and said that we couldn't help him, he laughed knowing he had beaten me and I understood him to say that he will get a new one when he goes back to Russia next... and I'm sure he will!

He was very proud of the repair he had done on the bridge and sought my approval... I nodded with a smile.

While I was upstairs, I took a couple of snaps for posterity just in case we ever receive a lawyers letter claiming we broke his glasses!

[Bill West]

He came in with a piece of crap and left with a piece of crap. It is always best not to mess with a deal like this. If you do you will be sorry and beaten.

[FVCCHRIS]

I can remember when it was not so uncommon to work with jobs like that on a much more frequent basis than we do today. I must say that those are the jobs I don't miss being involved in too often anymore. One of the things that I love about my work is the occasional opportunity to really make a positive change in someone's life by persuading them to try something new. Don't you ever wonder how many of "those" patients would have really loved those 1.74 lenses you were suggesting?? Maybe it would have been the most wonderful thing to happen to him in the last 30 years?? I think sometimes it's worth the risk to give it a shot! By the way, Listening to your story, I felt like I was there with you and I must say you handled it well! With my luck, simply touching those lenses or walking upstairs would have been a disaster.:D

[chip anderson]

He did his best on everything he did.

[Clive Noble]

He did his best on everything he did.

Hey Chip.... that's a good quote... it's almost the sort of words you'd expect to find on a gravestone

"He did his best on everything he did.... He was an OPTIBOARDER"

[Conoid of Sturm]

"He could sell." Unless the optician in question works for a charity, that would be my highest praise.

[Judy Canty]

The Value of a Licensed Optician



Licensed Opticians provide the consumer with an additional professional look at the results, in prescription form, of a complete eye exam. Their unique education and training prepares them to provide professional advice on the best interpretation of that prescription with regard to lifestyle needs and wants and the availability and suitability of current contact lens and spectacle materials.

Their Licensed status also requires that the Optician ensure the prescription has been correctly implemented in a form most suitable for the visual requirements of the patient, including corrective lens designs and materials chosen based on the visual requirements of the wearer, measured for precise opto-physiological alignment, fabricated to recognized standards, and fitted to ensure proper comfort and performance.

[LENNY]

Were they PGX on top of that?

I had seen the glasses made up in Russia bu the guy himself.
They were plastic frame simular to the one on the picture but larger .
-2.00 SV Glass lenses that had about 30 % gradient grey tint.
CT=1.00 mm
The thing that surprised me was the gradient tint which was verrrry uncomon in Russia. So I asked the guy how it was done.
This is the way he describe it.
He found an old TV tube, broke it and polished himself 2 lenses from the outer skirts of this tube. At the ends the tint was fading and thats what he used to get himself a gradient tint and -2.00 RX !
This is a top notch Russian Optician!