We are proud to be working with our colleagues in the Hospital Eye Service helping to relieve the pressure on the hospital eye service and manage the increasing backlog of patients who are experiencing increased waiting times for follow up care. Our Ebbw Vale practice has been running Glaucoma clinics for over 5 years, seeing patients who have been diagnosed with Glaucoma for their follow up examinations and sending the results electronically to the Ophthalmology team at the Royal Gwent Hospital to be reviewed. This allows us to ease the pressure on the very busy hospital clinics and allows patients to have regular reviews closer to their homes, and in a timely manner.
Our Mountain Ash practice has recently begun a similar scheme seeing patients from the Royal Glamorgan Hospital and Prince Charles Hospital eye departments for follow up Glaucoma checks. Covid-19 has created a backlog within the Hospital Eye Service, and we are pleased to be able to offer our highly qualified Optometrists to help to reduce the waiting lists for patients and hopefully prevent unnecessary sight loss. Across all of our Optical Centre practices we also offer retinal screening for Diabetic patients.
Patients are referred to us from the Diabetic Eye Screening service for Wales (DESW) to have a dilated retinal examination. These examinations allow us to detect any Diabetic retinal changes so that treatment can be offered as soon as possible to prevent irreversible sight loss. Additionally, one of our Optometrists (Roseanne Gill) has an Independent Prescribing qualification. This qualification allows her to diagnose and treat eye conditions without the need for the patient to see their GP or the Hospital Eye team. This enables patients to get quick access to urgent eyecare without having to travel long distances and without having to endure long waiting times in A & E clinics.
