Assessment of Office-Based Practice Patterns on Protective Eyewear Counseling for Patients With Monocular Vision.
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the practice patterns of office-based counseling on the importance of protective eyeglasses in monocular patients and to offer our counseling recommendations.


METHODS
In this cross-sectional study, data were collected in the form of surveys. Surveys were administered at an oculoplastic ophthalmology clinic in Michigan. Inclusion criteria included adults with vision of 20/400 or worse in only 1 eye. Survey questions were focused on whether patients with monocular vision recall being previously counseled by their primary ophthalmologist about wearing eye protection.


RESULTS
A total of 60 surveys were completed. The average age was 62.2 years old (range: 23-90 years old). Of the completed surveys, 56.7% (34/60) did not recall receiving education about wearing protective glasses over their better seeing eye, while 35.0% (21/60) recalled having received education from their referring ophthalmologist about eye protection, and 8.3% (5/60) were uncertain about receiving eye protection counseling. Twenty (33.3%) patients reported the reason for decreased vision. Of those, 35% (7/20) of patients reported monocular vision resulting from trauma, while 65% (13/20) reported vision loss due to other reasons. There was no significant difference in recall of receiving counseling about the importance of eye protection between the 2 groups (p = 0.74).


CONCLUSIONS
The results of this study highlight the current counseling short-comings, as more than half (56.7%) of patients surveyed did not recall being counseled on the importance of protecting their better seeing-eye, or ways of doing so. More counseling on protective eyewear needs to be incorporated into the preferred practice pattern for care of patients with monocular visual impairment because these patients are vulnerable to the devastating consequences of complete blindness as a result of an injury to their functioning eye.
*Kresge Eye Institute, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan; †Department of Ophthalmology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia; ‡Kellogg Eye Center, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan; §Eye Plastic & Facial Cosmetic Surgery, Grand Rapids, Michigan; and ‖Department of Surgery, Spectrum Health Hospital, Grand Rapids, Michigan, U.S.A.
Joseph D
JD
Boss
Christopher T
CT
Shah
Victor M
VM
Elner
Adam S
AS
Hassan
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D037001:Directive Counseling / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005135:Eye Protective Devices / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D010824:Physicians' Offices; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D015349:Vision, Monocular; D055815:Young Adult