Your news feature in the latest Optician journal reporting another Specsavers coup in medical care states that they, Specsavers are the first optician(s) to provide a specialist treatment centre for assessment, diagnosis and treatment of eye diseases.
I should like to bring to your notice that, aside from other many pioneering activities over the past 100 years, my practice, Sheinman Opticians operated a glaucoma treatment centre under the auspices of the NHS, the first of its kind.
Referred patients from optometrists and doctors were examined, triaged and treated by a team 10 members of staff from January 2009. The success of the clinic was based on ‘Choice at the point of referral’ and it quickly became the popular option.
The clinic was known as Nene Healthcare Glaucoma Centre at Sheinman Opticians.
We were forced to close the clinic after three years as it had grown rapidly to take a large a proportion of the glaucoma work on behalf of the general hospital’s eye department.
Sadly the NHS fees were totally inadequate to cover the service offered at the time as they failed to keep pace with the increasing success and growing numbers of patients.
John Sheinman, Sheinman Opticians, Northampton
