The life of an optometry student is far from glamorous, but if you follow @prettyeyez_mel on her popular Instagram account (734 followers and counting!) you can understand why so many of us love optometry and the 4 years we spend in optometry school studying this profession. Melissa McLean is currently a student at NOVA, and her obsession with everything eyes started when she was very young.  "I was born in Guyana, South America to parents of Indian descent and I have a hazel-green eye color (which is rare for Guyanese people). I grew up hating my eye color because the other kids made fun of me and called me "cat eye girl" which I didn't think was a compliment in those times. Cliche' as it might sound, I think I started appreciating my eye color when a boy thought I was beautiful because of it - that boy became my husband now. We liked each other for 16 years now and have been married for 5." 

You probably didn't see this one coming, but one of the biggest challenges new optometrists face is having an income for the first time. Living on loans for so many years of school, your first paycheck is an amazing luxury. And then every 2 weeks you get another one. But having an income can be a serious trap; we've all worked hard to get to this place where we finally can do things, buy things, travel, eat out, buy a new doctor appropriate wardrobe. With the luxury of having money for the first time comes a new problem -- you need to decide what to do with it. There is a strange paradox of having a great paycheck coming in (feeling you've made it!), but being deeply in debt from undergrad and professional school loans (nope, actually you are really, seriously broke still). Managing your money properly in those first few years after getting your first job can set the stage for your future financial success. Today's guest is Dr. Syed Hussain, the writer behind the informative and extremely readable financial strategies blog for professional students, The Broke Professional.  A 2009 graduate from the Pennsylvania College of Optometry at Salus University, Dr. Hussain has worked in nearly every type of modality of eyecare. He saw himself and fellow classmates struggle with financial decision making and planning after graduating, despite having good paychecks, and decided to do something about it!

Dr. Syed Hussain

Why did you decide on optometry? 
I come from a family of pharmacists which drove me to optometry since they warned me not to become a pharmacist.  All joking aside, I always wanted to work in the healthcare field and wanted a position that wasn't super stressful, has plenty of practice options and great income potential.  Optometry seemed like the best choice to me and still does.



You've worked in private and corporate settings.  What made you to decide corporate optometry was right for you?
I have been working full time in a corporate setting since 2010.  I enjoy corporate practice because I can still fully treat patients how I'd like and have free time outside of work to spend time with family and pursue my other passions (like blogging!).  

Negotiation can be so intimidating for new doctors, so I was thrilled to get a chance to pick the brain of optometrist Mark Phebus, the expert behind 20/20 Consulting.  Wouldn't it be great if you had your own personal coach with years of negotiating experience to guide you through your contract and help find ways to maximize your offer? That's Mark.  He's a graduate of Indiana University School of Optometry with a residency in primary care and ocular disease and now practices in Charlotte, North Carolina.  Since he began practicing, he's worked in both private and corporate practice optometry, and learned firsthand the importance of negotiating his own contract in the trenches of these experiences.  He sat down with us to answer a few questions about how to make the most of your negotiation.

64.6% of all new graduates were female in 2014 which means now more than ever we need to make strides to close the gender pay gap in our profession.  photo is my 2011 graduating class from the Southern College of Optometry

• Experience:  Did you complete a residency? How long have you been working? Often times job postings are listed with new grads in mind so a doc bringing years of experience would be able to leverage that for a better initial offer.  If you are a new grad, there is still a chance you can advocate for yourself as bringing more experience that an average candidate despite your lack of prior work history or higher training.  Did you extern at a highly competitive or challenging environment?  Completing externships at VA hospitals or clinics offering specialization in pediatrics or brain trauma treatment can give you experiences that even older doctors can't match.  How many patients did you see during your externships?  Keep a log of the number of total patients you saw (I know it is tedious, but just keep a spreadsheet going that you update daily during your rotations).   You may surprise yourself (and your employer) by how many patients you have already cared for, despite your lack of traditional work experience as a new grad.
• Specialties: Does your employer have interest in bulding specialty contact lens services, pediatrics, vision therapy, or low vision? Even if you haven't actually had experience in these areas, just telling your employer that you are interested in developing that area of specialty to expand the scope of their practice can set you apart.  Of course, make sure you follow up by talking about what training you will do (educational events, online lectures, pursuing certification, etc) to make sure you can deliver on this promise for providing specialized care.
• Skills Outside of Patient Care: Think about work you did in optometry school or before that could be valuable to your employer in their office.  Did you perform research or publish journal articles? Did you work in an optical lab cutting lenses? You might not be logging optical hours grinding lenses for your new practice, but even if your employer doesn't have an in-house lab, your optical skill set gives your employer confidence that you will be a great resource working with the opticians in your workplace.  You can even offer to train new staff in their optical duties. 
• Languages: Being bilingual is a huge asset.  You can build up your employer's patient demographic in whatever language you speak.  
• Social Media: Maybe your employer doesn’t have a passable website, or isn't using social media to its fullest (or at all). You could employ your skill set towards creating a valuable digital footprint for the company.   These social media skills are increasingly recognized by employers because an ad for their office in the Yellow Pages just isn't going to cut it anymore. You'll be worth your weight in gold to many private practice ODs if you can come in and take over that side of the practice.
• Technology: Are you applying for a position where they have not yet changed over to electronic medical records?  The window is quickly closing on how long doctors have left to change over before penalties arise, and they need skilled, EMR ready doctors like yourself to get the system in place. As a new or recent grad. you have also just worked with the latest and greatest new technology in eyecare at your school. You were running all of your own OCTs and fundus autofluorescence cameras.  Not only are you now valuable to the doctors you work for because you can show them how to use new technology to its full capacity, but you can also help train their staff on the proper ways to run this equipment for quality scans.  

Want to add value to your employer's business?  Specialty contact lenses have a huge demand, and can quickly grow the practice you work at with referrals from other area doctors that don't provide such services. image via

1. They want to add monetary value to their practice by seeing more patients
2. They are looking to find a retirement  plan, and need to bring someone on to phase themselves out. 
3. They want both options 1 and 2 because retirement is at least five years away.

Eyedolaty celebrates its 5th birthday next month, and it's been amazing how much has changed in the world of optometry in the short time since I began blogging.  We've grown from the days of a free blogspot domain posting pictures of conjunctival cysts and bad NBA glasses fashion, to a trusted optometric resource where thousands of readers around the world turn to find new technology and solutions to their unique visual challenges. There are more resources than ever for young ODs to find their way online -- from the educational articles at Review of Optometry, to the quick and fun guides at New Grad Optometry, and the inspirational success stories at Women in Optometry.  

Way back  in the archives to first year and the White Coat Ceremony at SCO

For those that don't know, I have a wonderful sister who I stole the idea of going to optometry school from.  She is fixing to take National Boards Part 1 next week.  By the way, I know it is extremely southern to say "fixing to" but I am doing it anyway.  It seems like decades since I sat down for the grueling Part 1 marathon, but it was really only 2 years ago.  I'm not going to remember it any better in the future, so here is my top advice for student doctors.

1) Study.                                                    

KMK has great online features to aid studying as well!

No, really.  It is kind of "common" knowledge in the optometry world that you need to study for Part 1 for about 3 months.  This test is going to challenge you with questions over EVERY subject you have had in school thus far, and on some things you probably have never heard of.   I didn't get the KMK study guide, but I had a lot of friends that did and I ended up being very jealous.  If you are super motivated, you can just use all the notes from all the classes you have ever taken as a study guide.  Or you can drop a couple of hundred dollars for a KMK guide to have it all streamlined with memorization tips and practice questions in one place.  It is worth your money, as much as a spendthrift like me hates to admit it.


2) Focus on high percentage topics
That means don't spend a ton of time on topics like contact lenses and binocular vision that are less represented on the test.  If you have had these classes recently, and you see that the topics aren't covered with a lot of test questions in the topic breakdown, you can spend the least amount of time studying for these.  Prioritize and study smarter, not harder.  The contact lens cases I had were very straightforward, so don't worry about having to perform crazy calculations.

3) There will be questions that you have NO idea what the answer is.
You may find yourself saying, "I never learned anything about that in class!"  This is normal, and I guarantee that everyone in the room with you is thinking the same thing!  Don't let it worry you; you aren't going to know the answer to every question.  That is why it is multiple choice.  Regardless of what the NBEO thought my year, I didn't have a class that told me the appropriate decade of life to recommend a flu shot.  So I just made a guess, and moved on.

4) 1 Week Before the Test

Truth: I have ray traced exactly 0 times since NBEO Part 1.

Work math problems.  Optics and contact lens calculations will be on the test, so don't miss easy problems like converting to plus cylinder because you aren't fresh on your formulas or math facts.  If you haven't thought about math in a while, it is good to run through some sample problems to brush up your skills.  The test is timed, so thinking fast is important.  If it takes you 10 minutes to work a math problem, things might get hairy on test day.  On optics problems, some people would rather do a quick ray trace than rely on straight memorization, so if you feel confident in your ray tracing skills it can save a lot of brain space for other formulas and lists.

5) The Night Before the Test
Don't try to flip through your entire KMK book again!  My best advice is to go through lists, formulas, and mnemonic devices.  Hit the big, high volume material.  Optics formulas were the thing I drilled most the night before.  I recommend writing the most common ones on a sheet of paper, and looking at that paper repeatedly until you can picture it with your eyes closed.  When you are allowed to start the test, some people prefer to jot down quickly all the formulas floating in their brain before they even read question one.  Hey, if it helps, go right ahead.

6) Time is not your friend
Don't mull over a question; skip the one you are struggling with, star it, and move on.  If you have time at the end of the session, go back and ponder your starred questions again.  If they are calling time and you don't have an opportunity to reread your marked questions, you can at least bubble in a random answer on your skipped ones.  Getting through the test is very important!  Don't get stuck and miss answering questions you could easily have gotten right if you had had enough time to answer them.

7) Don't try to compare your answers afterwards
It will drive you mad!  People love to discuss, but if you are one of those people that gets worried easily, skip the student circles that invariably form after tests.  If you don't answer the questions the same as your friends, it doesn't mean you failed.  You will NEVER know who got what questions right, so don't worry about it.


GOOD LUCK!

A question for the ages.  As an optometrist, I answer a lot of questions about vision and ocular health every day, but this particular question pops up more frequently than I would have suspected.  The simplest answer is this: if your glasses are the correct prescription, wearing them will in NO way hurt your vision. To be more thorough with this answer though, we actually need to break it down into several common scenarios:

1) My glasses prescription is correct, but it seems like my vision is worse than before when I take them off.  


I hear this often from patients that are new glasses or contact lens wearers.  If the glasses prescription truly hasn't changed, then vision without glasses looks worse than the patient remembered because they had never previously had crisp and clear 20/20 vision to compare to their own vision.  If your world looks blurry all the time, that becomes your normal.  Once you get used to 20/20 vision in your new glasses, that same amount of blur looks just terrible because now you know what you are missing!

2) I wear over the counter reading glasses, and I just keep having to get stronger and stronger powers.  Have I made my vision worse with the wrong reader?


For those individuals over age 40 that suffer from presbyopia (see this post for more details), reading glasses become a way of life.  Because over the counter readers are readily available, many patients will pick a pair in  the store based on what feels most comfortable, without seeing a doctor first to verify the necessary Rx.  The good news is that wearing readers will not hurt your vision even if you select the wrong power.  They can give you headaches if the prescription is too strong or too weak, but this is really the only side effect.  And rest assured, even though it feels like you are getting more and more dependent on your reading glasses, it is because your visual system is gradually declining at near due to normal aging changes (none of us are immune!) and not because of the readers.  My patients are also often concerned that they selected too strong a power in reading glasses (the powers typically span from +1.00 to +3.00), but a stronger pair will only give you greater magnification and force you to hold things closer if it is stronger than you really need.  No permanent harm done, but you will get used to a certain level of magnification if you use a particular power for a while.

Vera Bradley specializes in colorful OTC readers.  I also recommend Steinmart for a good selection.  Just remember, the quality of OTC readers is not the same as you will get with prescription glasses.  There's a reason many people call them "cheaters"-- in the correct power, they are just good enough to get you by!

3) Every year my child's glasses prescription is getting stronger. Is wearing glasses making his vision worse?


This question is the only one where we can get into a scientific debate.  Myopia can progress quite rapidly in children, and a number of factors influence this progression. Being near-sighted is a function of the curvature and length of your eye, which in turn is influenced by both genetics and environment. Numerous studies have shown a correlational relationship between amount of time doing near work (like reading) and the presence of myopia.  Whether myopic children tend to read more because it is easier for them than distance activities, or if they are myopic because of doing so much reading is under constant debate.  There is a school of thought however that near strain, or the strain on the eyes' focusing system when performing a task at near, can induce  myopia in an effort to relieve that strain.  An overview of these theories can be found in Myopia and Nearwork  by Rosenfield and Gilmartin.  As optometrists, we try to counteract this progression of myopia from near strain by:

• Prescribing the lowest possible prescription to attain 20/20 vision, and thus limiting the amount of near strain when reading with glasses.
• Prescribing bifocals or progressives for children when needed to ensure that their distance prescription does not adversely affect their reading facility.
• Studies have shown that certain contact lenses such as rigid gas permeable lenses or orthokeratology (where the patient sleeps in rigid contact lenses that act like a retainer to change their prescription overnight) can help slow the myopic progression in some cases. For more information (though it is quite technical), try this article:
• http://www.revoptom.com/continuing_education/tabviewtest/lessonid/106321/

This rigid gas permeable (or hard) contact lens has a special design that flattens the cornea overnight, leaving a myope with clear distance vision the next day.  This technique is best for myopes -4.00 in prescription or less.