It is clear the optician is capable of a refraction, they could learn to do it in a short amount of time, but I don't think it is a good idea. If patients are aloud to just get an new Rx, many ocular diseases will go unchecked. A two year degree is not good enough to give an adequate ocular pathology check, it's not even good enough to say there is something wrong and send the patient to someone else. So many illnesses show up in the eye first, opticians would miss most of them. I don't think it is good for the patient. If they are allowed to refract w/o an OD or ophth. present, ODs will starve. If you think OD are pushing for extended surgical rights now, you haven't see anything yet. If they are allowed to refract, I hope they are required to have an OD or ophth check the results and do a path check. It would be like the dentist. The optician would do what they can, but the doctor would would be right there and see every patient. This would at least help maintain some medical standards. Independent optician would hurt all of medicine. At the most, there MUST be a doctor in the building who checks every record before the patient leaves.
