Bill Harvey: The perfect prescription

The recommendation of low additions to those suffering from symptoms that might be associated with near work is again on the agenda, with some newer designs aimed at introducing a small add just for this purpose, and marketed as suitable for people of an age well before the onset of presbyopia.

I recently heard some concerns about who might actually prescribe this. If a pre-presbyopic patient with such near work associated symptoms brandishing an up to date distance prescription (but with no add specified) attended a practice and asked for such a lens, would the dispensing optician legally be able to offer the low addition lens? My view is that any addition must be prescribed, as part of the refractive correction, by an optometrist or other professional qualified to undertake refractive prescribing. Among other things, this makes it possible to ensure the symptoms are not related to other concerns, perhaps a near exophoria for example. This is not always made clear in some of the marketing materials currently doing the circuit.