News from the AOA's Blog

It seems difficult to believe that my term as AOA president will be over in a few days.  This has been an incredibly challenging time to be in a leadership position in a state or national professional organization, and I am both honored and privileged to have served the profession as your president this past year. 

I have also had the distinct pleasure of working with a number of very talented and dedicated state affiliate officers and state executive directors. Your affiliate association is the frontline within your state, and they have their finger on the pulse of local and state issues affecting the profession. I thank each and every state leader and executive director for their assistance and guidance over the past year.

But most of all, throughout my 10 years on the AOA board, and especially during my presidency, I have enjoyed the dialogue, the input and, most of all, the support of you, the members. Through my many phone and in-person conversations, e-mails, meetings and discussions, I understand that members are concerned about the future of our profession and how we can all make a positive impact.  I am thankful to all of my colleagues for your guidance and your candor.

In the House of Delegates last year, I asked the entire profession of optometry to step out of our comfort zone and face reality in an imperfect and volatile health care landscape.  Although it is not an environment of our choosing, we have seen the start of momentous changes in the health care delivery system in the United States. I thank each and every optometrist who worked with his or her member of Congress and senator to give optometry its biggest win for patient care in the last 25 years.

Through your efforts, optometry has cracked the armor of self-funded ERISA plans to achieve parity in participation and covered services. As part of the health care reform bill, the Harkin amendment also gives us tools for the first time to force traditional medical insurance plans and managed care organizations to include optometrists as providers for any covered services.

Yet there is much work still to do to ensure that our hard-fought gains don’t vaporize in a puff of regulatory smoke. The avalanche of paperwork for implementing reform at both the federal and state level, regional commissions and work groups, and state and federal cleanup bills promises to keep our leadership and staff incredibly busy over the next several years. 

Advocacy efforts on behalf of our members and our patients will remain critical to our success because, in some respects, our wins have helped paint a big target on our backs. Organized medicine and big insurance companies would like nothing better than to roll back the clock to “business as usual.” At press time, the American Medical Association is considering a resolution sponsored by the American Academy of Ophthalmology and the American Society of Anesthesiologists to call for the repeal of the Harkin amendment.

It is up to each and every practicing optometrist and optometry student to remain personally involved.  Your personal engagement in Keyperson activities and as an AOA-PAC donor are the key to keeping the patient access door propped wide open, and I thank you in advance for your active participation.

We have also seen the profession face new challenges in North America with attempts by a misguided minister of health in British Columbia seeking to turn his province’s health care delivery system back to that of a third-world country. As our colleagues to the north fight for their very existence, their patients run the very real risk of preventable blindness with new regulations that promote corporate business interests at the expense of patient health and safety. I thank those of you, including many state leaders, who have taken the time to write to Canadian officials to express our outrage at this travesty.

Board certification will soon become a reality for our profession, and I thank those colleagues who have discussed this topic in a civil and respectful manner. Reasoned and informed discussion remains a constructive means of developing and implementing a process that will be credible and defensible to patients and payers.

Thanks to my fellow AOA Board members who spend countless days on association business engaged in meetings, state visits, conference calls and e-mails. These national leaders miss family events and time that could be spent in patient care activities in order to advance the profession of optometry for the benefit of our patients.

And a special thank you to our AOA staff in both the Washington, D.C., and St. Louis offices and especially our Executive Director Barry Barresi, O.D., Ph.D. None of our efforts would bear any fruit without the incredible dedication and support of this hard-working team led by Dr. Barresi.

As Joe Ellis, O.D., assumes the AOA presidency in a few days, he will need your assistance and your involvement in charting our professional future.

To all of our members, thank you for everything that you have done for optometry over the past year and your continued dedication and support.

Faced with enormous challenges from outside, we need to remain united by our common interests in promoting excellence in patient care. 

As we look to the future, our profession will be stronger and our patients better served by all of our efforts.

Sincerely,

Randolph Brooks, O.D.
AOA president