Children and Opticians question

linni

My OP isn't really about where I get the prescription or the glasses. I just feel this 'age discrimination' and does it not apply to children?

nedmundo

I think they are just trying to reserve Saturday appointments for those who can't get in on other times i.e. Mond-Fri workers. Having said that, there should be some flexibility in the system.

Steve_xx

The problem is that if opticians allowed it, the clinic could potentially be full of children on Saturdays. Often when parents bring children for eye tests it might involve testing mum, dad and child too. This in itself isn't a problem but the children get bored waiting for their parents and if there were a lot of them together at the practise it can get a bit noisy to the annoyance of other patients. They will often sit around eating and drinking and really this isn't acceptable in a clinical environment.

Also, the children are often very young and that means the optician has to have the child in while the parent/s is/are being tested. Children are sometimes difficult to test and in the confines of the clinic they tend to wander about and sadly the parents aren't always good at controlling their activities. Im sure you can understand that several of these in a a day is stressful for the optometrist.

nedmundo

Steve_xx wrote: »

Of course you have a choice here. You can buy your glasses at the optician who tests your eyes, or you can take your prescription elsewhere to have them made up. There should be no problem associated with having your eyes tested at one optician and taking your prescription elswhere.

There should be no problem, but inevitably problems do sometimes arise. The patient will then potentially be caught between a pillar and a hard place with both places denying responsibility. Bearing in mind also, the Optician makes a loss performing just the eye exam, the fairest and most sensible thing to do is have your eye exam where you plan on getting specs made up.

Steve_xx

nedmundo wrote: »

There should be no problem, but inevitably problems do sometimes arise. The patient will then potentially be caught between a pillar and a hard place with both places denying responsibility. Bearing in mind also, the Optician makes a loss performing just the eye exam, the fairest and most sensible thing to do is have your eye exam where you plan on getting specs made up.

Well no not really. If your optician tests your eyes and then you decide to take the prescription elsewhere, then providing that the maker follows the prescription then there ought to be no problem. The problems may arise if the optician gives the wrong prescription of course. Or, the maker could produce the wrong prescription!

Many people choose to have their prescriptions produced by online providers. This may suit a lot of people, but perhaps not those with complex prescriptions involving prisms etc.

I could see a situation developing in the UK, where we will have testing only opticians, and all they will do all day long is test eyes and give out prescriptions. If that was the case I could see that the cost of an eye test would have to rise.

sillyvixen

where i work - we reserve the past 4 o'clock appointments in the week for children - and on saturdays we have a rule of 3 children per clinic (we generally run 3 clinics) this is done as the majority of our clients are over 16 and working monday- friday and we also have to consider their needs on a weekend! weekend apointments do get booked up weeks in advance for all age groups.

nedmundo

Steve_xx wrote: »

Well no not really. If your optician tests your eyes and then you decide to take the prescription elsewhere, then providing that the maker follows the prescription then there ought to be no problem. The problems may arise if the optician gives the wrong prescription of course. Or, the maker could produce the wrong prescription!

Many people choose to have their prescriptions produced by online providers. This may suit a lot of people, but perhaps not those with complex prescriptions involving prisms etc.

I could see a situation developing in the UK, where we will have testing only opticians, and all they will do all day long is test eyes and give out prescriptions. If that was the case I could see that the cost of an eye test would have to rise.

OK, but what if a patient doesn't tolerate a certain curvature of lens (e.g. lens form) or certain type of varifocal, a situation which occurs more frequently than you might think. That patient is going to passed pillar to post as neither party will want to accept responsibility. It's not as simple as it seems.

Steve_xx

nedmundo wrote: »

OK, but what if a patient doesn't tolerate a certain curvature of lens (e.g. lens form) or certain type of varifocal, a situation which occurs more frequently than you might think. That patient is going to passed pillar to post as neither party will want to accept responsibility. It's not as simple as it seems.

I didn't imply it was "simple", and yes you are right, there can be problems of the type you mention. However, those problems aside, I think it is good to be able to have choice.

nedmundo

Choice is good, but where possible, really folks should do thir choosing prior, and get their eyes examined at the same place.

Steve_xx

nedmundo wrote: »

Choice is good, but where possible, really folks should do thir choosing prior, and get their eyes examined at the same place.

No I'm sorry I don't agree. The system is set up to give people the choice to have their glasses made up at a different location to where they have their eyes tested. It would be anti-competitive to have it otherwise.