What happens when I come in?

When you arrive at the optometry department, the vision and strength of your eyes will be checked. You should bring any glasses, contact lenses or magnifiers with you.

You will be assessed for the suitability of contact lenses and which lenses are best for your condition.

A scan of the front of your eyes will sometimes be taken to look at their shape and to help determine the best lenses to fit for your eyes. The optometrists have a vast selection of lenses to choose from and are able to fit any type of eye condition that might benefit from contact lenses.

When the optimal lens fit is achieved, your lenses will be ordered and a follow up appointment booked, at which you will be taught how to look after your lenses, clean them and put them in and take them out.

Your lenses and vision will be monitored regularly to ensure the fit and strength remains optimal.

This appointment should take about an hour.

Refraction

For a low vision assessment, the patient will be refracted to determine the strength of the eye so the ideal glasses or contact lenses can be prescribed. This sometimes involves having drops put in the eyes to temporarily stop the patient focusing, which makes the results more accurate. The drops can leave the eyes blurry for a few hours, so driving or carrying out any tasks that require good close vision is best avoided until the vision clears again.

Magnifiers

After refraction, patients will then be assessed for suitable magnifiers depending on the tasks being carried out.  We have a large range of magnifiers for demonstration and when the ideal strength and design is found, the patient is given the magnifier on loan, to be returned when it is no longer helping. The patients are taught the way of getting the best from their magnifier and there is an optometrist on site every day if patients have queries or difficulties.