I work in a community eye care practice. Some of my patients have an eye exam and they decide not to have any new glasses. I’m worried that this will affect the prosperity of the practice. Do you have any advice?

This happens. We tell people how important it is to have regular eye exams and then we are sometimes surprised when they have an eye exam but decide not to have new glasses especially if their prescription has not changed.

When there has been a change in the prescription I show patients the improvement in visual acuity with the new prescription and most will take advantage of this improvement and have new glasses. A few don’t.

 I talk to patients about backup pairs of glasses, single vision readers for varifocal and bifocal wearers, photochromics for people troubled by the sun, reading glasses in the living room and also another pair near the bed, prescription sunglasses in all lens forms and check to see if they simply want a different type of frame even when there is no prescription change.

There are many reasons for having new glasses.

However, there will still be some patients who decline. It’s important to still give good customer service and not to force a sale. A forced sale will probably lead to an upset patient and bad word of mouth. Let them go with a smile and there is a good chance they will have new glasses next time.