Optometrist Intern at Voorthuis Opticians

Presenter: Ashley Ceresini, General Biology , Global Public Health Scholars

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For my practicum project, I interned at Voorthuis Opticians, an Optometry Office located in the Washington D.C. area. The office provides eye care, eye routine exams and offers prescription frames and contacts. I helped around the office, helped patients choose glasses frames and shadowed optometrists during eye exams and patient interactions. I learned how optometrists check and evaluate patients during eye exams and in some cases, the optometrists did procedures such as dilation to dilate the patient’s pupils and check to check for common eye problems such as glaucoma. I also learned the common tasks and duties that take place in a successful optometry office such as making glasses, the different prescriptions and contact lenses. The public health problem that I found was that since this office did not accept insurance and all the costs were paid out of pocket by the patient. This leads to a barrier of access to eye care for lower income populations. This is an important issue to acknowledge because not getting proper routine eye exams can lead to an increased risk of eye diseases such as glaucoma, cataracts and other common eye disorders.