Dr. Andrea P. Thau Becomes the AOA's 95Th President
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JUNE 2016 DEDICATED TO THE INTERESTS OF WOMEN ODs Dr. Andrea P. Thau becomes the AOA’s 95th president SUPPLEMENT TO WO2Q16.indd 1 6/2/16 2:32 PM NOW AVAILABLE: MORE POWERS! DAILIES TOTAL1® contact lenses DAILIES® AquaComfort Plus® contact lenses NEW range of powers: NEW range of powers: -12.00D to +6.00D -15.00D to +8.00D NOW YOUR HIGH Rx PATIENTS CAN HAVE THE POWERS THEY NEED, WHEN THEY NEED THEM. PERFORMANCE DRIVEN BY SCIENCE® See product instructions for complete wear, care and safety information. © 2016 Novartis 3/16 US-DAL-16-E-1159 WO0616_Alcon Dailies Combo.indd 1 5/27/16 10:09 AM p 3 The Editorial Pages Look at the New WO Website Change Is Good hen you’re in the middle of it, change can be intimidating. Any working mom whose kids are out of school for the summer knows that mix W of anticipation and dread that comes with the changes in the daily schedule. Any OD who has stared at blueprints or stepped over construction lumber on the way to realizing a dream practice knows that same range of emotions. Any OD who brings a new process or new Marjolijn Bijlefeld equipment into the offi ce understands that the hassles of moving through a learning curve will be worthwhile in the end. Change seems to be a theme in this issue of Women In Optometry, too. The optometry school 2016 graduates, some of them featured on peaking of change, Women In Optometry has redesigned pages 7 and 9, are about to undertake one of the biggest changes of their Sits website. Originally launched just two years ago, the lives, wrapping up about 20 years of education and stepping into the work- womeninoptometry.com website now includes more than force as newly minted doctors. Congratulations to all of you. 400 articles—for and about women ODs —with more being Our cover story features Dr. Andrea Thau, who will become just added each week. The new design is mobile-optimized and the second woman OD to become president of the American Optometric makes it easier to fi nd and read related stories. WO Association. While this change in leadership happens every year, those who are dedicated to reaching it travel this journey for years, committed to changing the profession for the better. Elsewhere in this issue, the offi ce design pages look at the changes that doctors envisioned and brought Your stories excite us at WO. They show us how committed you are into being for their practices. There’s advice from women ODs throughout to your patients, your communities and your profession. You’re bringing this issue on how to change an element of your practice, whether it’s change—large and small—every day. WO improving customer service—as professional co-editors Dr. April Jasper and Dr. Katie Gilbert-Spear discuss—or how to identify what’s special about your practice or how to bring some new service or product into the practice. Others are talking about change on a global scale: how to impact Marjolijn Bijlefeld, the problems of dry eye or childhood myopia, for example, in this country Director of Custom Publications and worldwide. Practice Advancement Associates Women In Optometry® is published quarterly by the Publisher: Al Greco Professional Publications Group of Jobson Medical Information, Managing Editor: Marjolijn Bijlefeld publisher of Review of Optometry, [email protected] • 540-899-1761 Review of Cornea & Contact Lenses and Review of Ophthalmology. Professional Co-editors: Katie Gilbert-Spear, OD, MPH, and April Jasper, OD, FAAO Address advertising materials to Scott Tobin, advertising production JUNE 2016 manager, Jobson Professional Publications Group, Associate Editor: Maggie Biunno 11 Campus Blvd., Suite 100, Newtown Square, PA 19073, Creative Director: Stephanie Kloos Donoghue at [email protected] or call 610-492-1011. Graphic Designer: Barbara W. Gallois Supporting Sponsors: Lead Sponsor: Cover photo by Jesse Dittmar Women In Optometry June 2016 WO2Q16.indd 3 6/2/16 2:32 PM Boost Your Practice Efficiency MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM Designed to help practice, office and optical managers gain the confidence and business expertise they need to positively impact their eye care practice. > Immersive 6-month experience combines live instruction with distance learning > Personalized coaching > Project-based learning initiatives to teach people skills and business strategies that managers can use to immediately improve practice performance Enroll today: Stop by booth LP11065 (866) 278-3187 ecpu.com/management-development-program ©2016 Essilor of America, Inc. All rights reserved. Unless indicated otherwise, all trademarks are the property of their respective owners. WO0616_Essilor.indd 1 5/31/16 11:31 AM p 5 The Editorial Pages The 96 Percent Problem By April Jasper, OD, FAAO, and Katie Gilbert-Spear, ✦ Details matter. The time we are most concerned OD, MPH, WO Professional Co-editors and with is the time from check-in to the optical. We track that Co-founders, Distinctive Strategies and Leadership measure and try to keep it below 30 minutes. We know our patients don’t want to be in our offi ce all day. If we nly one in every 25 complaints that trigger a two- take too long in work-up and exam, patients have no more star or lower rating in an online doctor’s review was time available to shop. As doctors, we need to be aware of the result of a perceived shortcoming in the actual this time, too. We don’t want to cut our time with patients Odelivery of care. The whopping majority—96 percent Dr. Jasper Dr. Gilbert-Spear short, but ultimately, the patient will appreciate being able of complaints—were the result of lackluster service: poor to spend a little more time picking out eyewear than having communications, disorganization and excessive delays in seeing a physician. to reschedule that part of the visit. These were the fi ndings of a study printed in the Journal of Medical Practice ✦ Analyze fi rst impressions. It is good to see your offi ce through Management in April. your patients’ eyes. Actually sit in the chairs in your reception area and listen, This is a big issue, especially if you’re fi nding that your online ratings smell, see and even touch the things that patients do. Is the reception area or aren’t as high as you feel they should be, based on your level of clinical front desk cluttered or clean? Is the staff harried or welcoming and focused? services, professional knowledge and quality of products. How do you fi x it? Is a phone ringing constantly at the front desk? Can employees’ conversa- Here are some strategies we’ve incorporated as part of our daily focus to tions be overheard? It matters not what we think of our practice. What mat- make sure that the patient experience is a good one. ters is what our patients’ perception is. Create an atmosphere of distinction. ✦ Reinforce the positive. We read reviews out loud at our team ✦ Look in the mirror. Not all the blame for low reviews can be meetings. Positive reviews encourage positive actions and allow us to hear, placed on staff. Doctors’ bedside manners got a knock in this study, too. in the patients’ own words, what really stands out to them. If patients men- Even more importantly, as doctors, you set the tone. The problem always tion that they notice a little nicety, the staff is more inclined to keep extend- comes back to the leader. We believe that bad staff stems from a bad ing those kinds of gestures. leader. Maybe we didn’t train people correctly. Maybe we didn’t hire the ✦ Look for the negative. If you don’t look for the negatives, you right people or we have them in the wrong positions. If we want to create might never know about them. We defi nitely want the feedback available change in the practice, it has to start with us. A great read on this topic is through patient surveys or Net Promoter Scores. Our Solutionreach patient Good to Great by Jim Collins. surveys provide fast feedback. Ideally, however, we would rather hear the ✦ Recover. You can recover from a lapse in patient service—and negative comments even before the patient leaves the offi ce. So we make it’s most impactful to do so right away. But that means your staff has to be a point of asking all patients, before they leave, about their experience, and honest about it happening, not just hope that patient won’t complain once we listen carefully to what they say. It is very important to look outside our he or she leaves. A great recovery can be the best marketing you ever have silos and adapt a team mentality. We want to know what’s going on in other for your practice because that patient will talk about it. Don’t get discour- parts of the practice, and we want to help each other improve because the aged when you make mistakes. Make it right, and then don’t make the patients’ overall experience refl ects on all of us. same mistake again. WO WO Advisory Panel Elise Brisco, OD, FAAO, Dori Carlson, OD, FAAO Mario Gutierrez, OD, FAAO Ann M. Hoscheit, OD Lauretta Justin, OD Dawn Kaplan, OD FCOVD, CCH Park River, North Dakota San Antonio, Texas Gastonia, North Carolina Orlando, Florida Chicago, Illinois Los Angeles, California Bridgitte Shen Lee, OD Jennifer Hidalgo Ong, OD Priti Patel, OD Tamara Petrosyan, OD Tonya Reynoldson, OD Louise Sclafani, OD, FAAO Houston, Texas Alameda, California Upland, California New York, New York Waverly, Tennessee Chicago, Illinois Women In Optometry June 2016 WO2Q16.indd 5 6/2/16 2:32 PM FOCUS on OUTCOMES A Passion for Pediatric Optometry By Catherine McDaniel, OD, MS, FAAO Alcon-supported interactive e-book brings clarity to children’s eye exams hen Alcon fi rst asked me to work on an advocacy project to Finding solutions educate parents and children on comprehensive eye care, I Pediatric optometrists must have a big Wwas thrilled.