Safety is more important than most of us realize when we put a patient into a new pair of glasses. If your office is ignoring patient lifestyle needs that could put your patients at risk for eye threatening trauma, or if members of your staff aren’t up to date on the latest lens materials that help prevent catastrophic accidents, you’ll want to read this brief report.

I’ll review a five-step method for presenting today’s safety eyewear options, plus snapshot views of which lenses are appropriate for varying patient needs. You’ll find that eyewear safety can be a critical component of dispensing success.

Remember that you’re liable if one of your patients is injured as a result of an improperly dispensed pair of spectacles. It’s your responsibility as the professional to ask questions pertaining to eyewear safety and to make certain each patient is aware of available products that will adequately protect him. Ocular safety guidelines established by the FDA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) outline the specific requirements.

Lifestyle dispensing can provide a safety net for you and your patients. Plus, lifestyle dispensing also increases your practice’s dispensary revenue. No single pair of glasses will satisfy all the visual needs of every patient – at least I haven’t seen one as of yet – so finding out about each patient’s particular needs and suggesting ways to help will increase the number of spectacles you’ll dispense.

How many times do you see a patient who works in a factory (with flying projectiles) who wants only to replace his dress safety photogray lenses in his old zyl frame?

This patient needs a pair of safety glasses for his job. OSHA says 1,000 or more ocular injuries occur daily in the workplace. A patient with inappropriate spectacles is at risk for becoming one of those statistics. Liability is an issue when you haven’t informed the patient that safety eyewear can improve his safety and visual performance.

Keep in mind that you don’t have to sell products in the exam room to meet your responsibilities. The Optical Laboratories Association (OLA) has published information that you can receive free of charge from your lab. It includes:

• Duty to warn information.
This clearly spells out your responsibility to make patients aware of potential hazards.
• A visual requirements survey.
This is like a short history form to assist you in making eyewear recommendations.
• A patient record information form.
This is placed in the patients’ files and shows what the optician recommended.
• A patient rejection form.
Patients sign this form if they reject recommendations made to them. It’s best kept in the chart. Then, if your patient is injured, you can prove that you did your best to guide him. This could help you avoid liability.

Having these forms available makes suggesting multiple pairs of spectacles seem less like direct sales and more like a professional service. The Vision Industry Council of America (VICA), available at 1-800-424-8422, also has pamphlets on lifestyle dispensing. I’d encourage you to get as much information as you can to protect yourself and your patients.

A number of situations require special eyewear. Patients who are monocular, children, athletes, industrial workers, patients with certain pathological conditions and ocular surgery patients all require extra consideration when being fit for spectacles.

Important to this safety equation is the appropriate lens. Many different materials are available, but polycarbonate is the only one to use when safety is the primary concern. Polycarbonate is much stronger than any other material. Your lab can provide material from the Polycarbonate Lens Council (PLC) to educate you, your staff and your patients on polycarbonate and its safety benefits.

The PLC recommends polycarbonate lenses for any patient who:

• works around machinery or equipment
• is a sports enthusiast
• needs safety protection during home or hobby activities
• is monocular or has severely limited vision
• is a child or active teenager
• has a sensitive nose or sinus area that requires the lightest-weight lenses possible
• works outdoors in full or partial sunlight. (Polycarbonate absorbs all harmful ultraviolet rays.)

Meanwhile, the frame options available today in safety eyewear are numerous. It wasn’t so long ago when talk of safety eyewear conjured up images of old gray or black zyl frames that no one liked to wear. Today, frame manufacturers produce a variety of thoroughly tested products to meet safety requirements and cosmetic needs.

All safety frames fall under the American National Standards Institute’s (ANSI) Z87.1 standards for safety. American Optical, Titmus and several other companies supply frames that significantly enhance patient safety. Talk to your local lab to find out what safety suppliers they have available.

Patients will buy glasses for safety if you give them a good reason. We all experience those patients who try to save money rather than investing in polycarbonate lenses for their children. But do we actually think that any parent would place $50 ahead of his child’s safety?

Proper presentation is the key to getting patients to put safety eyewear into the right perspective. Manufacturers provide a variety of displays and print material – again, available from your local lab – that are invaluable in demonstrating the importance of safety products. Patients don’t trust their doctors as much as they used to, so showing them the benefits of safety eyewear is far better than telling them.

Also, as the manager of a dispensary for a solo ophthalmologist, I find it helpful when the doctor recommends safety lenses and positions me as the expert on this issue.

Too often, I see practices where the doctor is too busy to bother with the details of dispensing. But if you truly want to make your dispensary a profit center, build up your optician as a professional and let him or her use your recommendations to dispense the proper eyewear needs for your patient.

You can accomplish your goals by relying on the optician’s extensive product knowledge and patient visual and lifestyle needs to guide proper dispensing options. Plus, your optician needs to have the time to explain the importance of eyewear safety products.

When the exam is over and you’re ready to fit the patient with spectacles, you want to be certain that he’s purchasing the right products for his needs. You also want your staff to treat him fairly in your dispensary. You want him to walk away feeling as if he’s received good value for his money.

Providing him with the cheapest product isn’t what will make your dispensary profitable. Patients should have a sense that their eyewear will meet their needs at all times because a well-trained person has helped them make smart choices.

If you conscientiously meet patients’ needs, using the advice in this article, you’ll maximize your success in safety eyewear. Properly educated patients are more than willing to spend extra money on the best option for themselves and their families. Your dispenser will find no need to use hard sales techniques.

Properly presented, safety glasses sell themselves.

The best part is that you feel comfort in knowing that you have protected your patients, minimized liability and stimulated business growth in your dispensary.

Nearly three out of every four workers who suffered eye injuries in one study were injured while not wearing eye protection.

• About 40% of those injured were wearing the wrong kind of eye protection for their jobs.
• An estimated 90% of eye injuries in the workplace can be prevented by proper protective eyewear.
• Some 70% of workplace injuries have been caused by flying particles or sparks.
• Contact with chemicals caused one-fifth of these workplace injuries.
• More than 40% of these workplace eye injuries occurred among craft workers such as mechanics, repairmen, carpenters and plumbers.
• More than a third of injured workers were operatives, such as assemblers, sanders and grinding machine operators.
  –Source: OSHA 1993 Fact Sheet

• A total of 43,659 eye injuries occur during sporting events and other activities each year.
  –Source: Prevent Blindness, 1995 report

• More than 198,000 eye injuries occur in and around the home each year – all associated with lawn mowers, power and hand saws, household tools, and household and garden herbicides.
  –Source: Polycarbonate Lens Council