Dispensing Opticians

Well, Winnie is back in Borneo for lunar (Chinese) New Year with her family and friends. So I am seeing my patients for full, FULL-service optometry.

Having a DO around is great. Winnie knows her stuff and has a really good eye as to what suits a patient. And because she is younger than I am, she is a little more on-trend - I do "classics"!

The hardest part of dispensing again is the advancement in lens designs in the past 3 years since she's been with me. Essilor is a very innovative company, so they release what is really a quantum leap in technology every 2-3 years, with a whole new philosphy of design, and I am having to research these. I trust Essilor that they all work, but some lenses are designed for improved near vision at the expense of arm's length (or vice versa) and that is the sort of detail that you need to know to advise a patient on lens design.

This morning I received a visit from the local Essilor rep - they have released Optifog, a new anti-fog treatment for lenses (it needs to be applied at the time of manufacture - it's not a retro-fit product) and a new lens design (well, new to me) that is great for someone who needs good near and computer distance, but not compromising their distance vision. Nikon Home and Office sounds great!

I am looking forward to Winnie's return in April with all of her traveller's tales. But in the meantime, I am re-learning the dispensing part of my profession. Dispensing opticians are our sister profession, and have an advanced skill-set in dispensing compared to most optometrists, but I am lucky that I get the fun of doing both.

Welcome to 2012!

Well, we're well into 2012 now - nearly two weeks gone already - and we have been back at work for 3 days. Good to be back.





We have had several patients who broke their glasses over the break, and in one case she had no spare as that had been broken a few weeks before Christmas too! How many spare pairs does one person need?





I hope that you had a relaxing break, as I did, pottering in the garden and reading. Also worked on upping my store of Vitamin D (working on a tan sounds so 1970's).





Hopefully 2012 will be way less challenging than 2011 (or 2010) was. We are already seeing patients who had recalls in either of those years coming in for exams. Everybody knows that that "the buck stops here" with health - no-one will look after you better than you do yourself, and there is a substantial amount of research saying that as folk get older, poor visual and dental health are correlated with poor health in general. We all can "see" that if you see poorly, you are more at risk of falls and falls and broken bones are strongly related to early death or loss of life quality at the very least.





So, lifelong eye care is a good thing. New Year's resolution - book an eye exam if you haven't had one within the last 3 years.