Optometry by Design

Dr. To began his speech by saying, “every 5 years after graduation, everything you thought you knew is about 50%.” Rephrasing this, not a lot is relevant 5 years down the road. The concept behind, “Design based thinking behind optometry” is to take it beyond just the basic exam. This talk was sponsored by VSP.

A little bit about Dr. To:

He went to UC San Diego, graduated in 2016, currently taking business courses while pursing a master’s in public health. On top of it all, he also works for Optometric Insights where he is in charge of the student mixture, working to help students get through optometry school.

The bottom line of today’s message is: Go beyond the eyes, and think about the person behind them. At the end of the day, how do you determine success = how well you understand people. Takeaway: if you do not understand people, you do not understand optometry. You can interact with people throughout your work day any way you want to, but you must be able to understand people.

Three true stories demonstrating bloopers in optometry:

-Dave, a grad student, went on a backpacking trip where he lost his glasses. When he came back from his trip, he went to his optometrist to ask for the exact same pair of glasses only to find out how expensive they were, about $800 to replace due to his high RX and visual needs. The other problem was that his insurance only pays for 1 pair of glasses a year. Due to his limited funds and the insurance debacle, Dave squinted his way through 1st year of grad school and never bought the glasses.

-Ben: works late, has lots of deadlines, sleeps in contacts. Always has problems with eyes due to this, but goes ons annually. His optometrist shares “horror stories” to “scare him” and shows images of giant papillary conjunctivitis among other infections to deter him from sleeping in his lenses. The bottom line is that due to a hectic schedule, Ben will inevitably end up sleeping in his contacts despite the scare tactics.

-Investor: emmetrope: hasn’t been to OD in years (“I see fine!” he says…) Nobody knows how often people are supposed to go to an eye doctor. What does he do? Googles it, googles how often to see an ophthalmologist. A trustworthy website from the American Academy of Ophthalmology states on their website that you should get a baseline eye exam at age 40. Hearing this news, the investor decides to dig further: sees vision screenings. Upon clicking on this link, it suggests to get a complete exam once in 20s and twice in 30s. Even our academy, the Academy of Optometrists, recommend an exam every other year or sooner. Remember these facts when patients come in for a first exam in years, as this is the information readily available to them, and can we really blame them for not knowing when this is the info they received?

Back to the true stories, who are these 3 people?

-The first guy in the story: Warby Parker

-Second Guy: Hubble

-Third Guy: Aaron founded Opternative.

-If we were in these situations, how would we have approached it? We don’t want others to be doing what we should be doing.

REDESIGNING THE EXAM

-How would you get patients to hear about your office? When you do graduate: get rid of the Yellow Pages! What about post cards? Better than yellow pages, but still can be a nuisance! When you send out an email, how often do you truly think people will read the email you send for advertising? How many emails do you open? (We open about 0.1% of our daily emails). Overwhelming influx of mail. These traditional tactics are not working anymore, you have to sit down and decide: what mediums would you use to reach out to the community? Facebook/Instagram/Tumblr, etc.? To answer this question, you must be able to understand your target audience. How many offices out there do you think have a Facebook? Think, how do you look for information when you are trying to research something? You must decide how to get your info out there, and even though the majority of us would state that texting is the best way to get ahold of us, if you received a text from an optometrist, you may consider that invasive. Remember to send your patients something like “Happy Thanksgiving,” every once in a while, because if they do receive anything from a business, they may immediately think that you are trying to sell them something.

At Dr. To’s office, there is no such thing as a waiting room, they like to get the patients engaged, especially if they came in early. How to deal with people being late? Help them out, pay for their valet parking.

The NCT: everyone’s worst nightmare! Not even the best way to measure IOPs. Do not use, they don’t like it, you don’t like it, get rid of it!

-Personal preference, Dr. To prefers to be called Will, introduces himself to patients as “Hi, I’m Will, tell me about your eyes.” A good way to build relationships, at the end of the day, I’m not better than you. I’m only better at one thing, it is eyes. Think about the relationships you want in your future practice. Will was an optician before optometry school, likes to talk about patients’ glasses. How do you respond to them when they say their glasses came from online or another competitor? Instead of lecturing: turn it around, “Wow, you’ve got some nice glasses, we have a pair similar downstairs if you wanted to check them out afterwards.”

-Options for contact lens sleepers: why do they sleep in contacts? Weird hours? Tired a lot? What are their options? Extended wear contact lenses. At Will’s office: write RX for both dailies and monthlies (buy 1 box of Dailies to use when life is hectic.) Helps with the issue of the complications that arise from overnight contact lens wear.

-True story:

Elizabeth, patient, likes funky glasses with all of the trimmings. Loved them when she picked them up, and came in a month later in tears saying that her glasses literally flew off her face as she was driving a convertible. Wants a second pair of the exact same. Dr. To said that at his office “we don’t benefit from our patients’ misfortune.” What did they do? Gave the replacement pair of glasses to the patient for a fraction of the cost. She was so happy, she bought 3 more pairs! Understanding how people think and feel are so important! Think about what you want to do in this scenario. Don’t feel like you have to fall into a template of how others think you should be. Remember: IF YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND PEOPLE, YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND OPTOMETRY.

Will.to@gmail.com, or any other social media.

Some Pointers Dr. To gave us after the talk:

He recommended to go to conferences to begin to build and broaden our network.

The Areas of Optometry in Big Need:

- Keratoconus (specialty contact lenses)

- Peds/VT

- Low Vision (requires a lot of patience, takes a lot of you)