News from the AOA's Blog

 The AOA’s Communications and Membership Group’s back-to-school campaign is under way. This grassroots campaign delivers the message that a comprehensive eye examination is an important part of getting Ready for School.

The AOA is happy to offer a free community promotion kit to the members again this year. This kit was designed to help deliver the Ready for School message to the member’s practice and community.  Read the rest of this entry ?

Jennifer Smythe, O.D. and dean of Pacific University’s College of Optometry, has been named to the executive committee of the Association of Schools and Colleges of Optometry (ASCO).

Dr. Smythe is the first woman to be elected to the committee and will serve as an at-large member.

A Pacific alumna who has served as dean since 2008, Dr. Smythe earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees and optometry doctorate at the university.

Prior to serving as dean, Dr. Smythe served as a professor, chief of contact lens services and associate dean for academic programs. She spent 12 years in private practice and has written extensively on vision care.

Founded in 1941, ASCO represents the interests of the schools and colleges of optometry in the United States and Puerto Rico.

With 30,000 members, the American Public Health Association (APHA) is one of the oldest and most diverse organizations of public health professionals in the world. The APHA is a key multidisciplinary advocate for development of policy that affects public health issues throughout the world.

The APHA’s Vision Care Section (VCS) is now celebrating 30 years of advocacy. The mission of the VCS is to promote health and well-being with emphasis on vision and eye health through interdisciplinary partnerships.

The VSC serves as an advocate to ensure equality in, and access to, vision and eye health care, and to ensure inclusion of vision in public health policy. With health care reform on the horizon, the VCS is facing one of its most important years yet. More than 25 VCS-sponsored resolutions are now fully supported by the APHA, all of which have been instrumental in federal and state legislative efforts.  Recent resolutions range from improving childhood eye care, to increasing access to vision rehabilitation, to eye care in disaster preparedness, to improving access to vision care in community health centers.  Read the rest of this entry ?

At Optometry’s Meeting®, Johannah Birney, left, poses with her mother, Roxanne, who wrote a children’s book titled “Johannah’s Lazy Eye” about coping with vision problems.

When Roxanne Birney’s daughter, Johannah, was getting ready to graduate from high school she sat down and talked to her mom about getting bullied for wearing glasses as a child.

“I could see the pain,” said Birney. “She was 18, and this had been when she was 4, 5, 6, and I thought this was something I needed to write about.”

Birney then wrote a children’s book titled “Johannah’s Lazy Eye” about a little girl coping with vision correction and her classmates’ reactions.

Birney said the book offers help in dealing with differences and understanding classmates and young children.

The book includes a note from the Birney’s family optometrist, Todd Erickson, O.D., who practices in Lantana, Fla.

The book also contains links to www.infantsee.org and www.aoa.org. Read the rest of this entry ?