Optometry took a giant step forward on Tuesday.
Neatly nestled in between the bank holiday weekend and the start of the school year was an announcement of independent prescribing rights for optometrists.
So much has been said about the forthcoming elevation of drug prescribing rights for optoms that it would be easy to think the decision had already been made.
But it hadn't, and it is only as of Tuesday that optometrists really do have it in their power to set themselves apart from fellow practitioners. By completing additional education and attaining specialist registration, optometrists can move into a new sphere of practice to interact and serve the public on a completely new level.
And this doesn't come a moment too soon.
The role of the optometrist has become the biggest casualty of the pig's ear that has been made of practice fee structures. The highly skilled role of the optometrist has been squeezed and squeezed as a sales lead generator for products and now those products are becoming 'commoditised'. The arrival of the internet and large retailers will accelerate this process relentlessly.
Optometry doesn't exactly have a clean sheet but it certainly has some experience to learn from.
Those experiences should be front of mind when setting the ground rules for how the profession is remunerated for therapeutic work.