Topcon RDx permits refractions from virtually anywhere.

Along with professionals from other fields, radiologists, cardiologists and many other health-care providers are increasingly leaving behind their offices and the hassles of commuting to enjoy the benefits of working from home.

Eye-care professionals, however, have largely been left out of the trend, which has picked up speed in this era of COVID-19 and social distancing.

“Now that telemedicine has taken off, many specialists are seeing their patients remotely. But, in ophthalmology, that’s been very limited because you can’t really examine the eye in depth remotely,” says H. Jay Wisnicki, MD, ophthalmologist and founder of Union Square Eye Care in New York City. “You can see a stye or other obvious condition, but that’s about the extent of it. You have to be in the same room in our specialty.”

That wall is beginning to crack, however, thanks to technologies such as Topcon RDx, an innovative software platform that enables eye-care practitioners to conduct comprehensive eye exams in real time from virtually anywhere.

SOFTWARE AND A PHOROPTER PLUS

“RDx introduces a new dimension in ocular telehealth, empowering practitioners to grow their practice beyond its physical location, optimizing speed, quality and reach of care,” says Christina Kirby, director of product marketing for Topcon Healthcare.

The RDx software, which launched in December 2020, connects exclusively to Topcon Health’s CV-5000S digital phoropter, permitting practitioners to perform fully remote refractions. Besides enabling face-to-face consultation from its dashboard user interface on any laptop or desktop computer, RDx automatically imports autorefractor and lensometer data and presets the refraction starting point on the digital phoropter to optimize the exam.

A mainstay of eye examinations for more than a decade, the CV-5000S can be operated by any qualified physician or technician, the company says. Data collected by the device can be downloaded directly to a clinic’s EMR system.

Dr. Wisnicki considers the technological combination a game changer for eye care.

“We’ve had two [CV-5000S’s] for a good 10 years or so,” says Dr. Wisnicki, who was among the physicians who piloted the RDx, which received FDA approval last year. “Now, we can actually run it remotely.”

THE “UBER OF REFRACTIONS”

Indeed, optometrists can be working from home, in another office or anywhere else, “so long as they are in a state where they are licensed to practice,” Dr. Wisnicki says. “In our case, we’re ophthalmologists, and an optometrist could be located anywhere because we’re the ones writing the prescription based on our own license [in New York].”

The RDx platform can be especially helpful to small practices and optical vendors whose patient volumes do not justify the services of a full-time optometrist.

“Let’s say you’re a practice somewhere up in the Adirondacks, and you don’t have enough patient volume,” Dr. Wisnicki says. “You could pay a remote optometrist, for example, on a per-refraction basis. It’s like, instead of owning a car and incurring all the expenses that entails, you take an Uber. [The combination of the CV-5000S and the RDx software platform] is like the Uber of refractions.”

To be sure, patients must still visit the office for eye exams and be positioned at the phoropter by a technician. A complete eye exam must also still be performed in person. RDx is best in cases requiring “routine refraction,” says Dr. Wisnicki.

“For some of the more unusual refractions, where someone has significant astigmatism or requires high-power lenses, RDx might not work quite as accurately,” he says. “But that’s not most people. For the 80% or more of cases, RDx works fine.”

Indeed, the RDx platform is proving especially useful in this era of COVID-19, when social distancing measures remain in effect in many places to limit the spread of the virus.

“A clinician can be at home with their kids, because everyone’s kids are in remote school these days. They can perform the refraction just as if they’re in the office,” says Dr. Wisnicki, who expects eye-care clinicians to continue working remotely long after COVID-19 goes away. “You can actually see the patient at the machine, and the patient can see the doctor. An optometrist working from home can take a measurement quite accurately.”

For more information on the RDx Ocular Telehealth platform or to request a demo, visit https://topconhealthcare.com/products/rdx . OM

Disclosure: Dr. Wisnicki is a consultant to Topcon Health.