Over 46,000 people are currently waiting for a public eye care appointment, the latest figures from the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) have shown.

According to the figures, at the end of December 2021, 38,900 people were on the outpatient waiting list. Of these, almost one in three (12,200) had already been waiting for more than 18 months.

A further 7,600 people were waiting for inpatient eye procedures.

Responding to the figures, Optometry Ireland insisted that optometrists could help to reduce these waiting lists and reduce overall costs.

One area that optometrists could have a major impact in nationwide is cataracts. 

“The excellent and HSE awarded ‘healthcare innovation’ Sligo cataract scheme began in 2012 and smashed waiting lists in the north west. That region still has the shortest wait time in the country. To run this scheme nationally would take only instruction from the Minister for Health. It requires no additional funding, no new infrastructure and no lengthy recruitment competition,” explained Optometry Ireland president, John Weldon.

He noted that community optometrists co-working with hospital surgeons is the best internationally accepted model to manage cataracts.

“We need our surgeons to be delivering surgery rather than dealing with work that is within the scope of practice of optometrists,” Mr Weldon commented.

The care of children is another area where optometrists could have a big impact. Mr Weldon described the current care of young people as “shamefully negligent in comparison to accepted international practice”.

“In addition to the postcode lottery created by disparate local eye care schemes, our national screening system for national school children has been let collapse, but optometrists have the capacity and expertise to lead out on delivery of a new programme for school children, relieving pressure on the HSE community health areas and hospitals.

“Where onward referral is required, optometrists can communicate with ophthalmology and HSE orthoptist colleagues through established secure electronic systems,” Mr Weldon suggested.

Meanwhile, optometrists could also have a role to play in providing other general services, such as the treatment of minor eye infections or the removal of foreign bodies under topical anaesthesia.

“Through a statutory instrument, current practices could be regularised and optometrists already established in inter-disciplinary working with GPs could be extended,” Mr Weldon noted.

Optometry Ireland insisted that the current delays in public eye care “can be easily addressed”.

“There are 300 practices and 700 optometrists all across the country who are highly trained, have state of the art equipment and have capacity to provide more services and at less cost than hospitals. Optometry Ireland encourages that in the interest of improving public eye health, a greater role for optometrists be sanctioned by the Department of Health and the HSE,” Mr Weldon added.