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Florida bill grants optometry board sole practice oversight - Healio

This is needed everywhere. It makes no sense that we can't train on new procedures and implement them. Having to go against other professionals that have a financial interest in suppressing our scope each time is wholly inefficient.
 
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It looks like it's a proposed bill that will be up for voting in March so it hasn't passed yet. Are there any state in the entire country that gives the optometry sole oversight over the scope of optometry? I don't think there is.
 
ODwire.org NewsBot said:
Florida bill grants optometry board sole practice oversight
Healio
Recent legislation specifies that the Florida Board of Optometry would have the sole authority to determine what constitutes the practice of optometry and that a licensed optometrist may complete a board-approved course and examination to become a ...

The State Board of Optometry should also be the only body that can determine a licensee's qualifications and eligibility to serve as a provider for any payer for optometric services in the state in which they are licensed.
Continue reading...
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The state Board of Optometry should also be the only body that can determine a licensee's qualifications and eligibility to serve as a provider of optometric services in the state.
 
Oh great. It's going to be completely impossible to get a Florida license now.
 
Perhaps other can copy this law if it passes and MA can finally get glaucoma prescribing rights?
 
Thought this was funny, but I recognized the name of the president...
 
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h.c. jang said:
Oh great. It's going to be completely impossible to get a Florida license now.
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Unless you already have one. I spent $1,000 on Jan 15, 2017 for a 2-hr CE course on Medical Errors in order to maintain my FL Optometric license current.

I flew from Austin, TX to Ft.Lauderdale, FL within a 24 hr period.
 
ODwire.org NewsBot said:
Recent legislation specifies that the Florida Board of Optometry would have the sole authority to determine what constitutes the practice of optometry and that a licensed optometrist may complete a board-approved course and examination to become a ...
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As it should be.
 
Russell Lee said:
Are you planning on practicing in FL in the future?
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When I was Assistant Professor of Optometry at Nova Southeastern University, I routinely advised optometry students to obtain and renew Florida optometry licenses, regardless of where they intended to make their careers, because of the large number of optometrists (as well as other people) who retire to Florida yet wish to maintain their professional activities on an, at least, part-time basis.
 
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Michael Barris said:
students to obtain and renew Florida optometry licenses, regardless of where they intended to make their careers, because of the large number of optometrists (as well as other people) who retire to Florida yet wish to maintain their professional activities
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I have heard South Florida referred to as the Optometric Valley of Death, referring to the huge oversupply.
 
Joe DiGiorgio O.D. said:
I have heard South Florida referred to as the Optometric Valley of Death, referring to the huge oversupply.
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Many optometrists have retired to Florida without Florida licenses. These optometrists frequently came to Nova Southeastern University (NSU) College of Optometry looking for employment as Clinical Professors of Optometry. The Chancellor of the Health Professions Division of NSU, a Senator in the part-time Florida State Senate, successfully sponsored a law permitting optometrists to receive special academic licenses to practice through license reciprocity. NSU was and currently is the only Florida optometry college for these special licensees to practice.

In the 1990s before this transpired, I did hear of optometrists retired to Florida being offered minimum wages to examine patients under the licenses of Florida license-holders.
 
Florida is an alligator infested, humid, hurricane battered swamp. I can't fathom retiring there.
 
Ken Elder said:
Florida is an alligator infested, humid, hurricane battered swamp. I can't fathom retiring there.
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What is on your bucket list?

You can always plan to take 3 showers daily in the Summer. :D
 
Ken Elder said:
Florida is an alligator infested, humid, hurricane battered swamp. I can't fathom retiring there.
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It was the fire ants that forced me out after ten years.

Florida is the only US state that has a homestead exemption. That is, your primary residence in the US regardless of how highly valued in the housing market, provided that it is in Florida, is exempt from bankruptcy proceedings. This suggests a plan involving a house with solar panels, water well, and subsistence farm (including clothing fabrics: cotton, linen, wool).
 
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I don't disagree with the Florida initiative but it does give me pause. Essentially we become the "D.O.'s" of eye care compared to "M.D's"....generally D.O.'s practice a more holistic medicine yet in many office's they work side by side with MD's.........My question is why would one want to go to Optometry school if the whole thrust was to be exactly like an OMD except in letters

Does this definition sound familiar in differentiating us from OMD's??? :

Doctors of Osteopathic Medicine, or DOs, are fully licensed physicians who practice in all areas of medicine. Emphasizing a whole-person approach to treatment and care, DOs are trained to listen and partner with their patients to help them get healthy and stay well.(hmmmmm Binocular vision etc)

DOs receive special training in the musculoskeletal system, (HMMM V.T.?)your body's interconnected system of nerves, muscles and bones. By combining this knowledge with the latest advances in medical technology, they offer patients the most comprehensive care available in medicine today.

Osteopathic physicians focus on prevention, tuning into how a patient's lifestyle and environment can impact their wellbeing.(HMMMMMMMMMMMM) DOs strive to help you be truly healthy in mind, body and spirit -- not just free of symptoms.
 
Steve Silberberg said:
I don't disagree with the Florida initiative but it does give me pause. Essentially we become the "D.O.'s" of eye care compared to "M.D's"....generally D.O.'s practice a more holistic medicine yet in many office's they work side by side with MD's.........My question is why would one want to go to Optometry school if the whole thrust was to be exactly like an OMD except in letters

Does this definition sound familiar in differentiating us from OMD's??? :

Doctors of Osteopathic Medicine, or DOs, are fully licensed physicians who practice in all areas of medicine. Emphasizing a whole-person approach to treatment and care, DOs are trained to listen and partner with their patients to help them get healthy and stay well.(hmmmmm Binocular vision etc)

DOs receive special training in the musculoskeletal system, (HMMM V.T.?)your body's interconnected system of nerves, muscles and bones. By combining this knowledge with the latest advances in medical technology, they offer patients the most comprehensive care available in medicine today.

Osteopathic physicians focus on prevention, tuning into how a patient's lifestyle and environment can impact their wellbeing.(HMMMMMMMMMMMM) DOs strive to help you be truly healthy in mind, body and spirit -- not just free of symptoms.
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Not every O.D. would seek to provide advanced medical care and procedures. I do believe that O.D.s SHOULD have options to advance their scope or pursue other medical avenues. The fact that a doctoral level medical profession such as ours is so restricted is not a good use of our training and abilities. There are very few medical professions with this much training that have so few options and this is artificially created by competing professionals. Can you imagine O.D.s telling M.D.s what they can and can't do with their license? It makes no sense that other professions like dentists and podiatrists are allowed so much more practice freedom.
 
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Scott Caughell said:
There are very few medical professions with this much training that have so few options and this is artificially created by competing professionals.
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The issue of options for optometrists has frequently been debated on ODwire over years. I do not agree that they are limited.

One might search my name on ODwire to recover these debates.
 
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