Amir Khoshnevis, OD
Keeping contact lens patients comfortable in their lenses–and in your practice–is a constant challenge. To keep your contact lens patientshappy, I recommend establishing a “Center of Excellence” mentality. Here is my seven-step process for achieving excellence in your contact lens patient experience.
1. Stay up-to-date on new technology, and be the first to try new products. Seems simple but too many of us are creatures of habit and this leads to a less than stellar optometric practice.
2. Educate your staff on advances and new options;they often have many opportunities to influence patients.
3. Place strategic educational materials in the exam lane. This serves as a reminder for YOU to discuss new technology just as much as it helps educate your patients.
4. Establish a protocol of questions to be asked by the technicians:
a. How often do you wear contact lenses?
b. How often do you sleep or nap with your lenses in?
c. On a scale of 1-10 (10 being best), how happy are you with your contact lens comfort? And vision?
d. If you could improve something about your contact lenses, what would it be?
5. Show patients a list with accompanying pictures of the top-selling contact lens solutions, and ask them which solution they are using. Thisremoves the need to ask multiple, repetitive questions due to vague answers by patients. Pictures improve response accuracy and time.
6. Always take the time to read patient responses. Too often, the questions are repeated by the doctor, which leads to an annoyed patient. The key to having influence in the exam room is being prepared to address the patient’s recently verbalized problems and needs. If you go in asking “how are you doing with your contact lenses?”, especially after they already said “fine” to your techs, you are asking for a dead-end conversation.
7. Consider asking one or more of these questions when you engage the patient in the lane:
a. How would you rate your comfort throughout the day? What about your vision?
b. Are there times you wish you could see better with contact lenses?
c. If you could wear your lenses on whatever schedule you wished, how would you wear them?
d. Have you considered discontinuing contact lens wear due to discomfort and poor vision or any other reason? If so, can you elaborate?
e. What are some aspects of contact lens wear you wish you could change or eliminate? You are hoping with this question to engage the patient in an open discussion about solution use, overnight wear, cleaning of lenses, etc. This will open the door for you to address the patient’s true frustrations with contact lenses, if any, and stop them from seeking answers elsewhere.
Key point to remember: if you’re not asking the right questions, if you are not truly examining the eyes for early contact-lens related problems (likeexamininglids to look for early GPC, for example). If you are practicing “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” medicine, you’re likely to see a decline in your contact lens business with the aging population headed into their 40’s and 50’s. The number one reason for the huge dropout in that age group is comfort. If you’re OK with “fine” as an answer, prepare yourself for an “OK” contact lens practice. Truly happy contact lens patients are more loyal because they trust your opinion more (versus thoughtlessly prescribing the same lenses for many years in a row), they are more compliant with their wearing schedule, they return more often then spectacle patients and they bring in more revenue over their lifespan in the practice than spectacle-only patients.
What do you do to ensure your contact lens patients stay comfortable and happy in their lenses? Any questions that you think are especially important to ask?
Amir Khoshnevis, OD, founded Carolina Family Eye Care in 2003. He is a graduate of the Pennsylvania College of Optometry and is a member of several optometric associations. He is a presenter at AOA and SECO. Dr. Khoshnevis has a strong interest in specialty contact lenses and has built a medical co-management contact lens practice as well as a clinical investigation site for specialty lenses. To contact him: drk@carolinafamilyeyecare.com.
