Work for American Best

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Originally Posted by Shnurek

lol I got owned again. I think I need a break from SDN until I start reading things more carefully.

Yes please. We will count the seconds until your return...

Originally Posted by Shnurek

lol I got owned again. I think I need a break until I start caring more to read things more carefully.

Like I've said at the end every post:

Originally Posted by Shnurek

lol I got owned again. I think I need a break until I start caring more to read things more carefully.

So basically what we've all been saying all along. At least you realized it. Good job.

lol I got so many people riled up, guess I'm a good trollololol

Originally Posted by johnnydrama

Yes please. We will count the seconds until your return...

Nice gunner pic, go gun. Now just because you followed me here I'm going to go back to your radiology forums jk

Originally Posted by balltc

So basically what we've all been saying all along. At least you realized it. Good job.

Who are you?

Originally Posted by Shnurek

lol I got owned again. I think I need a break until I start caring more to read things more carefully.

That was a long hiatus. You couldve made your "break" a bit longer...

Originally Posted by Shnurek

Who are you?

Someone else that got annoyed enough to call you out on your weak info. Enjoy your time off...

Originally Posted by trangngy477

Hello everyone,

Have anyone ever worked for American Best as an optometrist? Can you please tell me a little bit out the working condition? I have heard many not so good reviews about the company and is not sure if I should work there or not. Thanks

Originally Posted by Jason K

I'm going to be short and blunt here. It's the absolute worst that optometry has to offer. In fact, I'd stop short of calling it "optometry." If you need the cash, then so be it, but be aware that you'll be doing roughly 8 "exams" per hour (yes, you read correctly). I have several friends who went to them right out of school, enticed by the 6 figure salary. None of them lasted more than a year and one told me she would routinely cry on the way home from work (not kidding). I think that's a bit extreme, but it's garbage optometry at its worst.

The working condition can vary. Depends a lot on your store manager and district manager though. You'll have typical retail hours, rushed 5 minute exams (if its a busy store), constant asking to upsell optional visual fields and glasses coatings/styles. The management rarely appreciate you and so expect to run over your lunch and leaving time. But I think its obvious that its not a highly recommended company. But as Jason said: The "six figures + full benefits" is not even close to the norm in private practice. But most docs I know who have worked there have left between 1-5yrs. To each their own.

Originally Posted by Meibomian SxN

The working condition can vary. Depends a lot on your store manager and district manager though. You'll have typical retail hours, rushed 5 minute exams (if its a busy store), constant asking to upsell optional visual fields and glasses coatings/styles. The management rarely appreciate you and so expect to run over your lunch and leaving time. But I think its obvious that its not a highly recommended company. But as Jason said: The "six figures + full benefits" is not even close to the norm in private practice. But most docs I know who have worked there have left between 1-5yrs. To each their own.

What if you just take your time with each patient, can they give you the boot? I know they might not sign a lease with you again but if I had a contract with them then I wouldn't care if 30 patients were waiting. Let them complain to management Would this work? I'm def not a push over.

Originally Posted by Shnurek

What if you just take your time with each patient, can they give you the boot? I know they might not sign a lease with you again but if I had a contract with them then I wouldn't care if 30 patients were waiting. Let them complain to management Would this work? I'm def not a push over.

Try that and let us all know how it works out for you. Clients (I refuse to call them patients) who go to AB for their glasses do not want you to take your time with them. They want to be in and out in 10 minutes.

Originally Posted by Jason K

Try that and let us all know how it works out for you. Clients (I refuse to call them patients) who go to AB for their glasses do not want you to take your time with them. They want to be in and out in 10 minutes.

Being a customer of America's Best, I completely agree with this. I just want you to give me my new prescription, a trial pair of contacts, and let me order them by myself from home.

Originally Posted by Jason K

Try that and let us all know how it works out for you. Clients (I refuse to call them patients) who go to AB for their glasses do not want you to take your time with them. They want to be in and out in 10 minutes.

People that come in to get their glasses/contacts at most, if not all commercial places are referred to as "customers," not as "patients" by the employees. If you work commercial, you'll feel that way too after a while. After all, these retail places only care about optical sales and use the OD to pump out Rxs for them. Imagine, if you're going to end up in commercial setting, you're devoting 4 yrs of your life and be in debt in the range of 150K-200K to get your OD degree, but in real life you're only be doing a refraction. You can forget all the ocular disease you're trained for in OD school. Recent grads are already having a hard time getting on medical panels due to oversaturation, so I don't know how future grads will be able to get on. If you can't get on medical insurance, you can't do medical eye care that you are trained for while in school. They don't tell you this when you're in school, but this you find out when you graduate and by then it's too late. Retail optometry is taking over and it's ruining the profession.

Originally Posted by NYCBlues

People that come in to get their glasses/contacts at most, if not all commercial places are referred to as "customers," not as "patients" by the employees. If you work commercial, you'll feel that way too after a while. After all, these retail places only care about optical sales and use the OD to pump out Rxs for them. Imagine, if you're going to end up in commercial setting, you're devoting 4 yrs of your life and be in debt in the range of 150K-200K to get your OD degree, but in real life you're only be doing a refraction. You can forget all the ocular disease you're trained for in OD school. Recent grads are already having a hard time getting on medical panels due to oversaturation, so I don't know how future grads will be able to get on. If you can't get on medical insurance, you can't do medical eye care that you are trained for while in school. They don't tell you this when you're in school, but this you find out when you graduate and by then it's too late. Retail optometry is taking over and it's ruining the profession.

Unfortunately, all too true. The sad part is, the pre-ops on here filter out information like this because it doesn't fit into their image of what optometry should be. Many of them hear this stuff, but choose the "optometry is an awesome career prospect because this 1st year OD student I talked to said it was" mentality. The truth is, their fate is practically sealed before they even start. Retail is the future of optometry. The medical side will be there in training only. We're printing out of thousands of refracting techs right now at a cost of about 200K a copy. The retail companies love the idea of more schools - more people who have nowhere else to go but into one of their script production boxes that feeds their opticals. Thousands of people all fighting to get onto a life boat designed for 10. Pretty sad.

If I knew then what I know now.....

Originally Posted by Jason K

....The truth is, their fate is practically sealed before they even start. Retail is the future of optometry. The medical side will be there in training only. We're printing out of thousands of refracting techs right now at a cost of about 200K a copy.....Pretty sad.

If I knew then what I know now.....

Originally Posted by NYCBlues

....Imagine, if you're going to end up in commercial setting, you're devoting 4 yrs of your life and be in debt in the range of 150K-200K to get your OD degree, but in real life you're only be doing a refraction. You can forget all the ocular disease you're trained for in OD school. ....They don't tell you this when you're in school, but this you find out when you graduate and by then it's too late. Retail optometry is taking over and it's ruining the profession.

Stop preaching the truth on here, lest the students just label you as a bitter, unsuccessful OD.

Originally Posted by Meibomian SxN

Stop preaching the truth on here, lest the students just label you as a bitter, unsuccessful OD.

Yes, I know. It's amazing to me how much more some pre-ops seem to know about the profession than we do.

Originally Posted by Shnurek

What if you just take your time with each patient, can they give you the boot? I know they might not sign a lease with you again but if I had a contract with them then I wouldn't care if 30 patients were waiting. Let them complain to management Would this work? I'm def not a push over.

You do not sign a lease with America's Best, the company will hire you as an employee. Employees that don't do what their "boss" wants them to (7 minute exams, and push outdated contacts), get fired.

America's Best doesn't care about you and the care you give your patients, they just care about you writing a spectacle Rx so they can sell some glasses. The more spectacle Rx's you generate in one day, the happier management is... regardless if you missed a RD, or didn't have time to explain amblyopia to a parent, etc.

Originally Posted by Meibomian SxN

Stop preaching the truth on here, lest the students just label you as a bitter, unsuccessful OD.

Wish back when I was in the process of applying to optometry school back in 2003-2004, someone would have told me the truth, instead of letting me find out the hard way. Now I feel I would do the pre-optometry students a disservice if I didn't tell them the truth.

It's hard for the pre-ops to imagine what we know, since they have not experience anything yet. Like I have mentioned before, if you are smart, you will rethink of optometry as a career. Don't talk to any optometrist who's a generation ahead of you, but talk to the recent grads and you will get a clearer picture.

Originally Posted by Jibslider

America's Best doesn't care about you and the care you give your patients, they just care about you writing a spectacle Rx so they can sell some glasses. The more spectacle Rx's you generate in one day, the happier management is... regardless if you missed a RD, or didn't have time to explain amblyopia to a parent, etc.

And an important thing students/doc should not forget is that these 'refracting houses' will not be held liable for the retinal detachment or diabetic retinopathy you miss because you are so rushed to see the next 10 customers tapping their feet waiting for you to give them their Rx. The store doesn't care. It's your license on the line and YOU will be the one sued.

Originally Posted by Tippytoe

And an important thing students/doc should not forget is that these 'refracting houses' will not be held liable for the retinal detachment or diabetic retinopathy you miss because you are so rushed to see the next 10 customers tapping their feet waiting for you to give them their Rx. The store doesn't care. It's your license on the line and YOU will be the one sued.

It's like we've been saying all along. THIS is what people are signing up for today when they choose optometry. This is the future of the profession - retail optical being driven by written Rxs in a commercial setting. Notice, children, that I did not say "Drs. Rx" since it's not at all unlikely that at some point in the near future, ODs will be pushed aside in this setting and replaced with refracting techs if/when they get independent refracting rights, just like they do in many other countries. When that happens, we'll be a giant redundancy. ODs would be stuck between MDs who can do ocular health and refracting techs who can write, sell, and dispense corrective lenses of all kinds. Oh, and then there will be about 50,000 ODs who can fulfill the same roles.

Do yourself a little thought experiment. Imagine you're in charge of some optical somewhere and the law changes one day. Now you can hire/contract an OD for $45 or $50 per hour or per exam to write Rxs and do "eye exams" in your little box with an optical attached to it. Or, you can hire/contract with a refracting technician to sit in the same box writing the same Rxs, but he or she will only charge you $15 /hr or exam. Hmmmmmm......I wonder which one you should choose.

If you read about America's Best and you think to yourself, "I'd never practice in a place like that - I'm going into private practice," you need to really consider what the future holds. There are many, many new grads out there right now working in jobs they never dreamed they'd get forced into. For every "success story" of some new grad working in an OD or MD office for 75K/yr with benefits, there's 20 more working 4 or 5 PT Walmart/Sam's days, trying to make ends meet.

This is real stuff and it's not going to go away any time soon.

America's Best is truly the worst! I have friends who nearly lost their sanity working there. Not only did they have to see the obligated 50+ patients a day at 2-5 min exam intervals, but they were also harassed to never dilate patients or provide proper care.

It's true that they pay better than "some" other locations. You usually get 105K to 110K to start, depending on your area.