Acquiring new skills can add immeasurable value to any job, and UK optics is blessed with a range of opportunities and training providers.
Furthermore, this applies across the full set of optical disciplines. While optometrists are being encouraged to refresh their knowledge of cataract, glaucoma, AMD and diabetes screening in order to provide NHS services for packed out hospitals, dispensing opticians are providing more services and optical support staff taking the opportunity to extend their expertise.
In addition to bolstering experience and confidence, candidates are increasingly in need of a CV that can boast extra training, while many have made career transitions without going off the payroll at all. The fact practitioners are arriving from overseas to embark on UK training illustrates there is every reason to investigate career-changing resources sitting right on the doorstep.
Worshipful skillset
Optical workers can find a wide suite of training courses through the Worshipful Company of Spectacle Makers (WCSM), which are mostly completed through online distance learning with some practical components – known as blended learning.
Debbie Gigg, director of training at the organisation, tells Optician how anyone who is not a GOC-registered member of an optical practice or manufacturing lab can enrol on a course with the WCSM.
Therefore, this includes optical assistants, customer service assistants, lab technicians and those involved in glazing and manufacturing. Courses primarily attract those in situ within the optical industry. With many of the large multiples and manufacturers providing their own in-house training, the WCSM is a key provider of training for independent practices and labs.
The livery company’s education programme includes spectacle manufacturing, optical customer service, optical technician, rimless glazing, retail skills, practice support and optical screening qualifications.
Quantifying whether it is employers or their staff who take the lead in signing up for WCSM courses is difficult, says Gigg, although a survey in Scotland suggests an approximate 50/50 split for funded courses. The WCSM also offers an optical care certificate that is accredited in Scotland.
She says: ‘The main reason why independent practices support staff is to develop and motivate them, and also educate them on the limits of their responsibility. There’s a point at which people should say to their patients “right, just bear with me while I get a professional member of staff who can help you with this”.
‘It means staff are more informed and confident, and obviously there’s a better patient experience. Employers now are beginning to understand that actually they’ve got to compete with the multiples, because the multiples do many things very well – training being one of them.
‘They do get a lot more from their staff if they’re educated and informed and it’s recognition, saying “you can do this job but let’s get you formally qualified to demonstrate you can do it”. It also puts them on the career ladder and that’s another major thing.’
Training trial
Undertaking extra training can reignite and add purpose to the ambitions of practice staff. The WCSM courses are pitched at three different entry levels spanning level two to level four and can also serve as a ladder up towards other qualifications such as becoming a dispensing optician. Meanwhile, holders of the WCSM’s Level 4 Qualification for Optical Technicians, popular with qualified DOs, are entitled to put the letters SMC(Tech) after their name.
Gigg, who herself went from retail optics to qualify as a dispensing optician before diversifying into HR practice, says: ‘It gives people a chance at career progression without throwing them in at the deep end.
‘We also find that people like to do it as a bit of a trial, from the employee and employer point of view. It’s a good way for the employer to find out how dedicated the learner is going to be and how they’ll cope with it, but also from the learner point of view as it gives them a bit of an insight.’
The WCSM also tailor-makes training to suit employers, which may not offer a specific qualification but cover required areas. Interest in screening, glazing and hand edging has grown in recent years as practice demands evolve.
Meanwhile, Gigg said pre-screening as a delegated function was a useful piece of training to get a new member of staff started on.
She says: ‘It’s fairly straightforward and they don’t have to make any judgments themselves. Somebody will show them how to do it and off they go.
‘But, obviously, from a practice manager point of view you want that member of staff to have the understanding why they are doing these tests and how it works, rather than just asking the patient to answer some questions and pushing a button. If you give them that knowledge they feel more informed and confident about what they’re doing and it comes across much better to the patients.’
Although further training helps with the understanding and confidence of workers within the practice, there is no guarantee it will lead to a pay rise. She adds: ‘You might find that the odd employer might give out a recognition of qualification bonus to say well done for doing the course. If it’s a commercial practice where there’s bonus on achieving targets they’re more likely to do this as they’re more confident, and they are more likely to sell product if they understand the product.
‘For OAs who are allowed to dispense, if they’ve got that confidence, background and untelling knowledge they are more likely to discuss the progressive lens, different types and the best type of lens. There is higher earnings potential because they are going to be more confident in their subject.’
Furthermore, WCSM is a recognised awarding body – meaning its qualifications are portable and can be used towards further studies within optics or external qualifications such as pharmacy.
Clinical approach
For dispensing opticians and optometrists, further training and CET is available to those wanting to take on more responsibility within practice and potentially boost their earnings potential. CET is an essential requirement of registered professionals, but some go one step further with higher qualifications in specialist areas.
The Association of British Dispensing Opticians (ABDO) is the awarding body for five optical qualifications, in ophthalmic dispensing, contact lenses, low vision and spectacle lens design, including through the ABDO College in Canterbury, Kent. Much like the WSCM, ABDO College courses are based on a mixture of blended and distance learning, ranging from access to advanced and honours courses – allowing qualified professionals to specialise in specific fields of interest.
In addition, ABDO has bolstered its CET offering to meet new requirements for more interactivity.
ABDO head of marketing and communications Michael Potter says: ‘The current CET cycle, which has seen the introduction of enhanced CET requirements, has generally been well-embraced by ABDO members. Mainly due to the need to acquire interactive CET points, the association has witnessed a considerable increase in attendance at its regional meetings. The added benefits of attending ABDO meetings and its annual conference include the advantages of social interaction and networking with fellow colleagues, which to some, particularly those who haven’t participated in such events in the past, has come as an enjoyable and professionally useful revelation.
‘The ABDO CET department has produced an extensive series of peer review, peer discussion sessions, workshops and visual recognition tests that have proved to be highly popular; one of the greatest successes has been the paediatric dispensing workshops with the innovative use of anatomically correct models of children’s heads.
‘Nowadays, many dispensing opticians see the acquisition of the FBDO qualification as a stepping stone towards additional further education in their chosen profession. Via courses offered by ABDO College, there is a growing trend towards specialisation in contact lenses or low vision.
‘Another exciting development, now that dispensing optics is becoming a degree-based profession, is research – with a number of ABDO members currently undertaking, or about to embark, on Masters’ degree programmes. To stimulate and to assist its members with this route to greater professional fulfilment ABDO has recently established a research fund.’
Meanwhile, the College of Optometrists offers higher qualifications for those optometrists keen to step in and provide extra eye care services for an overstretched NHS. This includes its higher qualifications framework for glaucoma, low vision and medical retina, available through a variety of learning institutions in the UK.
Speaking to Optician Workplace, Jackie Martin, the College’s director of education and Ruth Brough, its lead assessor, explain how demand for the courses was expected to increase – not least due to rising pressures on the NHS.
Martin says: ‘We’ve tried with the qualifications to keep the level which is very much relevant to community optometrists, but also for those who have access and work within hospitals and want to take it further.’
Indeed, the College framework includes professional certificates, professional higher certificates and professional diploma. Web seminars and tutorial content are used by each of the providers, including Cardiff University, City University London, University of Ulster and Moorfields Eye Hospital, to different extents.
Brough says: ‘With the basic certificates the focus is really on distance learning and there will be some clinical elements to it so that essentially they spend a couple of days at the university being trained and assessed in particular skills but it’s only a small part of the basic certificate, whereas with the higher certificate there’s more focus on the skills.’
The professional certificate in glaucoma is at present the most popular College accredited course. Its first courses were accredited in 2011, before they were up and running the following year, and around 250 people have completed the glaucoma certificate since through the various providers. Around 60 have the low vision qualification and there has been a lot of reported interest in the new medical retina course at Ulster. ‘I think they’ll be lots of people interested in the retina because they’ve already got involved in diabetic screening in the workplace and that’s just part of medical retina so it will open up interest for people in other areas too.’
Martin adds she hoped more specialist eye care clinics would open on the high street as a result of the new education. ‘People are coming to us for two reasons. One is because they have an interest and want to do it for professional development. Others are saying “I need to have this qualification”. There’s a variety of reasons but it would be good to think that in time it will lead to people being able to set up clinics.’
Brough says: ‘At the moment across the country there are various second screening schemes that are running, some in more areas than others. I think that triggers an interest in people, so if you’ve been trained to do second screening for glaucoma, for example, then you might have been required as part of that to do WOPEC online training through Cardiff. If you sign up for this WOPEC starts telling you about the MSc course that they run and you would already gain some credits towards that and you can choose which areas you want to specialise in.
‘But for some people it might just be that they’ve done the WOPEC training and they think “actually I’d like to look into this a bit more”. I think that’s the hook for these higher certificates. What we’re trying to do is provide a platform for people so that once they’ve done the training locally if they want to further their education in that area and gain a College-accredited qualification, which is transferable, then they’ve got this platform to use.’
Study duration varies from one provider to the next, but the College knows professional certificates take 150-200 learning hours, completed at the discretion of the candidate. Depending on how much time someone has to commit this could take up to a year to complete. Meanwhile, work is also underway for a qualification in paediatric eye care as soon as next year, the College also revealed.
[CaptionComponent="666"]Points for prizes?
Beyond furthering clinical expertise the question again remains whether the acquisition of extra clinical qualifications equates to greater earnings potential on the high street? But the message seems to be don’t bite off more than you can chew.
Brough says: ‘It does depend on the funding options. There will be people who are keen to do more but can’t afford to do it because of the funding. It’s not like you get the option of dipping in a bit, because once you’re on the radar then you face becoming inundated. You can control it in your practice and say you’re only going to do part of the week, but then you get patients who need to be seen but can’t be.
‘That’s the top and bottom of it. You might have people who are interested to get involved but daren’t because it might put them under a lot of pressure.’ In Wales, meanwhile, schemes have worked well after winning buy-in nationally to help meet the demand collectively.
Meanwhile, the Local Optical Committee Support Unit (LOCSU) has rolled out training to assist areas wanting to provide more enhanced eye care services for the NHS.
For example, LOCSU’s Leadership Skills for Optical Professionals course, part of WOPEC’s MSc programme at Cardiff University, targets practitioners looking to take on local leadership roles with their Local Optical Committee (LOC). The training, through a mixture of face to face and distance learning, has trained 31 people in the last three years capable of leading at a local level to help win new eye care contracts. LOCSU also offers induction training for new officers going into the LOC setting, and bespoke roles within the organisations, such as finance leads.
LOCSU managing director Katrina Venerus says that embarking on training also develops wider networking skills and helps practitioners diversify their businesses to cope with the current economic climate.
She adds: ‘This kind of work in the medium to long term has got to be valuable. People have got the skills but it is just training them and giving them the tools to look at how services are performing. We support LOCs to get contracts in the first place, but then we don’t just leave them to it.’