October | November - Missouri Optometric Association
October | November - Missouri Optometric Association October | November - Missouri Optometric Association
October | November 2008 President’s Message I want to begin by thanking each and every one of you for showing your support for the Missouri Optometric Association and our great profession of optometry. Optometry...why do we practice this profession? I’m not here to tell you why you specifically practice optometry, because all of us have made that decision for different reasons. However, I am here to challenge your thinking about optometry. • We know optometry is ranked in the top 10 to 15 best jobs in the country by numerous publications. The outlook for demand is positive although we have many battles ahead. Wes Kemp, O.D., MOA President • We know optometry allows us to feed our families and in most cases have a decent and comfortable lifestyle. • We know in this day and age when many are losing their jobs, the economy is tight and there’s not a lot of optimistic talk about the future, people will continue to need healthy eyes, and good vision to perform in society. Look at Third World countries and see how they struggle when vision and eye health care is not taken care of properly. It is a service to humankind we need to reflect on. I seriously believe if we took away the fact that our profession is ranked in the top 10 best jobs, if we took away quality of life and income that we receive for our services, and even if we took away the consistent need for healthy eyes, most of us would still be in this profession because it is our nature to serve and help others. If we took the Meyers Briggs Personality Scale, I believe most of us would score high in the area of caring for others. There are many hoops we have to jump through and many opportunities to become disgruntled with our jobs. Things like: • dealing with insurance companies which many times brings out the worst in us; • being concerned about potential threats of lawsuits; • dealing with the frustration of health care, as the rules continue to change, sometimes daily; and 2 • dealing with the thoughts that optometry is not what we thought it was going to be because of incorrect expectations. Continued, next page.
October | November 2008 President’s Message, continued from page 2 However, service to others is what is important and what we need to focus on. There are things that we need to address this year and in the near future of the MOA. • We need to work with the MOA Public Relations Committee in helping us work through some of the bad publicity that we have received from the Children’s Exam Law. Although this law is for the good and welfare for the children of Missouri, it has been disseminated in the media as self-serving and a bother for both parents and school districts. We need to push forward and continue to inform the public how important vision is to the learning process and not assume that parents know that information. • We need to evaluate and address any legislation that deals with access and freedom for patients to choose the providers they wish to use. This issue will affect patients and doctors both in rural and metropolitan areas and is in the best interest of our patients. • We need to continue to assess our scope of practice. Because of the changes in technology, we have to continually be looking for how we can affectively treat and take care of our patients. Because of new technology, such as nanotechnology, the way we treat patients will be dramatically different in the years to come. If we say we are happy with our current treatment regime and it becomes obsolete in ten years, where does that leave us? We do not have a choice because we are a legislated profession. We have to continually be changing, because we want to offer excellent vision and ocular health care with the latest and most updated treatment available. My greatest concern is for the involvement of members in our Association. I understand that it takes time away from family, duties of the office, and other interests that we have to be involved in the association. But the Association protects and promotes us in the future of our profession. I know older doctors may say, “I have put my time in and I am tired of the associations work” and the younger doctors may say “I have no interest in being involved because of the time factor and effort.” We have to meet somewhere in the middle. I hope many of the older docs will reflect on how privileged we are to have had this life and career in optometry. I hope we will push forward and promote optometry for the next generation so that they may also enjoy this profession. I hope that we will be challenged and encouraged by the younger ODs to maybe get a little spark back to help our profession. 3 Conclusion, see President’s Message, page 9
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<strong>October</strong> | <strong>November</strong> 2008<br />
President’s Message, continued from page 2<br />
However, service to others is what is important and what we need to focus on.<br />
There are things that we need to address this year and in the near future of the<br />
MOA.<br />
• We need to work with the MOA Public Relations Committee in helping us work<br />
through some of the bad publicity that we have received from the Children’s<br />
Exam Law. Although this law is for the good and welfare for the children of<br />
<strong>Missouri</strong>, it has been disseminated in the media as self-serving and a bother<br />
for both parents and school districts. We need to push forward and continue<br />
to inform the public how important vision is to the learning process and not<br />
assume that parents know that information.<br />
• We need to evaluate and address any legislation that deals with access and<br />
freedom for patients to choose the providers they wish to use. This issue will<br />
affect patients and doctors both in rural and metropolitan areas and is in the<br />
best interest of our patients.<br />
• We need to continue to assess our scope of practice. Because of the changes<br />
in technology, we have to continually be looking for how we can affectively<br />
treat and take care of our patients. Because of new technology, such as<br />
nanotechnology, the way we treat patients will be dramatically different in<br />
the years to come. If we say we are happy with our current treatment regime<br />
and it becomes obsolete in ten years, where does that leave us? We do not<br />
have a choice because we are a legislated profession. We have to continually<br />
be changing, because we want to offer excellent vision and ocular health care<br />
with the latest and most updated treatment available.<br />
My greatest concern is for the involvement of members in our <strong>Association</strong>. I<br />
understand that it takes time away from family, duties of the office, and other<br />
interests that we have to be involved in the association. But the <strong>Association</strong><br />
protects and promotes us in the future of our profession. I know older doctors<br />
may say, “I have put my time in and I am tired of the associations work” and the<br />
younger doctors may say “I have no interest in being involved because of the time<br />
factor and effort.”<br />
We have to meet somewhere in the middle.<br />
I hope many of the older docs will reflect on how privileged we are to have<br />
had this life and career in optometry. I hope we will push forward and promote<br />
optometry for the next generation so that they may also enjoy this profession. I<br />
hope that we will be challenged and encouraged by the younger ODs to maybe get<br />
a little spark back to help our profession.<br />
3<br />
Conclusion, see President’s Message, page 9
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