Hi smileyriles,
Although I am a student just getting interested in optometry, after this summer of intense researching for myself, I found some useful info that you may be able to use. Some of them are a little bit contradictory (the salary figures, for example, since there are many factors influencing it), but I believe they will still help you.
For a typical day of optometrist, you can check out the Princeton Review website.
www.princetonreview.com. Or better yet you can directly ask/observe some optometrists practicing near you. There are also plenty of knowledgable and friendly optometrist/optometry school students in this forum, and I'm sure they can give you better inputs.
For hours/salaries, I just type in "optometry" in yahoo/google and you will get A LOT of information on those. The U.S. Bureau of Labor has the official figures but then again I believe many other factors are influencing the stats.
Is optometry a good career choice? I think it really depends on how well you know yourself and how much effort you have put into soul-searching and career-matching for yourself. Personally I have researched and observed in medicine, dental, pharmacy, and optometry and found optometry to be more of my thing.
I'm sorry that my first posting is this long. As a student determined to find her right career path before it's too late I hope other students will benefit from the info that I have. But you may want to ask more ppl since my opinion may be biased/inaccurate without my knowledge.
have fun career-hunting
simplyanny
