Why do so many people use Internet sights for their eye care needs? The answer I have come up with is lack of professional advice in most optical practices, where are the Dispensing Opticians - in meeting as the practice manager in most cases. I have been a practice manager and from personal experience the two roles are so different you cant always put the patient first as the manager as your sales hat goes on, as a dispensing optician you can have the patient interests at heart and if that means letting the patient leave without a purchase then that's fine.
I feel that if all patients are given the correct advise for them and only them the loyalty will continue and the patient will see eye care as a health profession and not a sales area. The uptake of eye examinations will increase and the frequency will also increase as people wont leave a visit to the optometrist until there is a problem. This will also reduce the high level of undiagnosed eye conditions in England and wales - Scotland has NHS tests for all patients when that was introduced a 5% increase in referral's to hospital for major eye conditions such as glaucoma.
So in conclusion we need to be stating the importance of regular eye examinations to all, not tests examinations as I strongly believe that a test suggests sales and a examination implies heath care.
No comments:
Post a Comment