Opticianry and Optometry

[MarySue]

Removing a contact lens fitting provision from such a bill would not be changing the status quo one way or the other. If opticians could fit contact lenses under the supervision of another professional in the first place, which they often can, this would continue to be the case had such a bill been enacted. It is not limiting the scope of opticianry, it is just not expanding it to include independently prescribing contact lenses.

Optometry became licensed professionals with a limited scope of practice first. Then, eventually, and only after establishing a significiant base of specially trained optometrists, optometrists fought successfully to expand their scope of practice. They did not start demanding concessions such as DPA and TPA right out of the gate.

I still think the problems lie within opticianry. You have two sides on this debate, imho. First the die hards who insist on all or nothing (your experience it appears was controlled by this first group.) The others who say, "don't rock the boat, at least we're working.)

In NZ, we approached the optometry association asking for their advice and assistance on applying for an increase in scopes of practice. We were met with polite replies and positive nods from most, however the outcome wasn't didn't match the response from the optometry association's board.

To sum up our position: we hoped to be able to 'refract under supervision' - no contact fitting, and no prescribing. The benefit would be to the rural areas where one day visits often see an optometrist faced with 100 people waiting to be seen.

In eight years time, approximately 8 graduates were estimated.

With the Durban Declaration announcing:

• 153 million people in the world have impaired distance vision because of Uncorrected Refractive Error;
• Many millions more people over the age of 45 years have impaired near vision (presbyopia) due to Uncorrected Refractive Error;
• Persons with blindness and vision impairment are entitled to the same basic human rights as are enshrined in all national and international standards, declarations and conventions;
• Uncorrected Refractive Error drives children and adults further into poverty by limiting their opportunities to education, employment, and seriously impacts their quality of life and productivity;
• The link between poverty and visual impairment due to Uncorrected Refractive Error places a heavy economic burden on individuals, their families and communities;
• The paucity of services, personnel, training institutions, affordable glasses especially in the developing countries are the main contributing factors to Uncorrected Refractive Error.

The course on refraction we wanted to us was already being taught by a reputible institution to dispensing opticians in Asia. We even wrote to the World Council for Optometry, and they reviewed our proposal. We again had asked for their input to help create a workable collegiate environment between opticianry and optometry, offering our country as a trial run, so to speak. We thought our timing was right.

We were wrong.

.

Our country has 180 Dispensing Opticians, over 600 optometrists, and yet - we still failed in our attempt to work together and create something valuable.

I have the utmost respect for optometry, and their right to fight for what they believe is beneficial to the public. But, what will it take for opticians to realise that we need standards of care which are consistent: state to state, country to country?

If anyone has any ideas - I'd love to hear about "what we should do" not "why it won't work"

:cheers: