Member News
18th January 2011
John Baron MP has urged the government to address the public health challenge of reducing avoidable sight loss.
Speaking at the annual Eye Health Alliance parliamentary reception on Monday night, Baron, who is co-chair of the all party group on eye health and visual impairment, called on the government to rectify this matter when the public health outcomes framework is published.
"We need to act now to stop more people needlessly going blind by encouraging people to have regular sight tests, so that eye conditions are detected early and treated accordingly," Baron said.
One hundred people in the UK start to lose their sight everyday and, with an ageing population, this is only going to increase. However, over half of this could be prevented if detected and treated early.
Nick Bosanquet, professor of health economics at Imperial College London and author of the report, Liberating the NHS: Eye Care – making a reality of equity and excellence, spoke of both the challenges and opportunities ahead for eye care.
"We need to make better use of the high quality and easily accessible resources available in local optical practices to take the pressure off hospital eye clinics and GP surgeries,"he said.
This is the premise of Bosanquet’s report, which sets out a detailed plan for reforming eyecare services where more routine hospital eye clinic appointments are provided in local optical practices, freeing up capacity in hospital eye clinics so those patients who need urgent treatment for sight threatening conditions such as glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration can receive treatment more quickly.
Bosanquet sees this new model, tried and tested by the Local Optical Committee Support Unit (LOCSU) in places such as Somerset, as "an opportunity to ensure eye care is raised much more strongly in the next announced phase of health care reforms".
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