I don’t understand why Robert Longhurst (Viewpoint, February 9) so dislikes the majority of patients perceiving him as a ‘sales representative’. I fear his use of the word patient goes to the root of the problem that pervades dispensing optics. Given that most DOs work on the high street, how can any DO consider the people coming in to buy spectacles or sunglasses are ‘patients’? I bet you that the vast majority don’t see themselves as such.
A good DO has to be both an excellent salesperson as well as an informed one. Does it matter one jot what label ‘patients’ confer on you, if they continue to come back because you are better than the unqualified sales assistant down the road?
And with the greatest respect, just because you have some knowledge of anatomy, pathology and pharmacology, it doesn’t necessarily follow that you are a competent DO. How much of the work actually requires knowledge of these subjects? Indeed, without selling skills a DO will get nowhere fast and I would not take on one with distinction in all subjects taught at college, if he was unable to sell an umbrella, manning an umbrella stand in the middle of a downpour!
I sympathise with Robert since the decision to allow unqualified staff to dispense does seem to negate the need for qualified DOs, but the reason for this falls squarely on opticians that preceded him many years ago who simply over-exploited the protected market. Now that unqualified DOs are ‘allowed’ to dispense it is pointless to try to go back to the ‘good old days’ – this will never happen.
I simply do not agree with Omen (Optician, March 2) and others who consider that DOs are at the forefront of providing primary health eye care. I believe DOs must stop thinking that their primary or even remotely important duty is to detect subconjuctival haemorrhages and the like. This is not the reason why I trained and should not (with respect) be the reason most would ever consider training as a DO. I don’t agree that a DO is trained in a similar way to an optometrist and neither should they be. I do agree that many optometrists know little about dispensing and most consider it ‘beneath’ them, but this is where the qualified DO can show his worth. I think DOs must concentrate on the non-clinical tasks and other very demanding aspects of running an optical practice, rather than consider themselves as ‘junior’ optometrists. The training should be tailored for the very different job that DOs do and reading ‘Viewpoint’ perhaps the training is too ‘clinically’ based. Indeed, surely I should not continually come across qualified DOs that cannot work out the correct uncut size to order, but can probably tell me the difference between episcleritis and conjunctivitis?
I cannot agree that it was irresponsible for the government to allow an optometrist to dispense spectacles ‘legally’. It is recognition that most people (and certainly an optometrist) can safely dispense spectacles and anyone who says different is talking nonsense. It does not mean that they can dispense spectacles well, but what harm can anyone, however incompetently trained in dispensing optics, do to a ‘patient’ – a headache or sore ear, maybe? Of course, I would have preferred it if only qualified people could dispense prescriptions, but I was never one to think this had to be done for the eye safety of the public.
I don’t think DOs need look either to the DoH or the GOC to give them the recognition they think they deserve. DOs will get that from returning ‘patients’ or what I am quite comfortable calling, ‘customers’.
David Levy, Radlett
Reference last week’s anonymous letter.
Jaguar did not have a V8 engine in the 1970s but made do with straight sixes and V12s.
Readers should decide whether this error detracts from the rest of the comments expressed.
Nicholas J Rumney