Telehealth

Remote Eye Care

As the world changes we are all adapting. Your eye and overall health is important to us and for that reason there are some things that remain unchanged. As eye care practitioners, our top priority is to assess your ocular health and your visual demands.

Telehealth by your eye doctor provides patients an opportunity to reach a provider without visiting the office. Eye related telehealth visits with your PCP however are just too lacking! Due to recent updates regarding COVID-19, we are now regularly performing telehealth visits for eye emergencies and urgencies using your medical insurance.

The doctor will use your reported symptoms, eye history, and a video conference to diagnose and triage appropriately until you can get into the office to confirm a “remote diagnosis”. In certain instances the doctor may  delay a visit to the office until some future date.

We are limited on the types of exams we can provide via face time or smart phone camera because of the very subtle microscopic details that are important in order to perform comprehensive ocular evaluations. However, as a specialist who already knows your eyes, your eye doctor can be very helpful with many types of conditions. 

What Can We Help With Remotely?

Some conditions we can help and initiate a treatment plan or where telehealth may otherwise be appropriate are:

●     Dry eye syndrome

●     Conjunctivitis (great care should be taken in Contact Lens induced red eyes)

●     Dermatitis or rashes around the eyes

●     Hordeolum/Chalazions or styes

●     Itchy eyes from allergies

A telehealth exam may not be possible or acceptable for some other symptoms like flashers, new/changing floaters, sudden vision loss or foreign body removals, however once again, we can provide triage and consultation on your eye care far better than your primary care doctor.

 We are not able to use telehealth to monitor conditions like glaucoma, macular degeneration or diabetes, but we could again counsel you on questions and review your medications and decide how long you might be able to go until we have you return to the office.

Comprehensive Eye Exams

Getting your eyeglass and contact lens prescriptions via tele-medicine is, in our opinion, not appropriate as we are unable to assess visual acuity (vision on an eye chart) and/ or binocular function (how well your eyes work as a team).

 In a world where demands on one’s time are increased and the visual demands are increased due to the use of computers and phones more hours per day, an optimal glasses prescription is imperative. We are in the process of evolving systems where you can access our office for measurements and testing with our team, and then consult with one of our doctors in real time who will interpret the data and formulate an optical or refractive treatment plan!

●          Pros:

○          Patients who are at high risk and/or unable to come into the office are able to receive medical care which otherwise would not be received

○          Limits exposure to the doctors and staff for potentially asymptomatic positive patients

○          Able to use medical insurance for telehealth visit

●          Cons:

○          Limitations regarding details associated with corneal and retinal diseases

○          Patients with no access to phone or internet aren't able to benefit from this feature

○          Reduced reimbursement to providers