BCLA boost for CL compliance

July 16 2012

The BCLA has produced a new patient handout for members to aid contact lens compliance. The move is part of its ongoing pledge to be the leading resource gateway for the contact lens community.

Entitled, ‘Your Checklist for Healthy Contact Lens Wear’, the single-sided, colour handout is based on current evidence and features a checklist for patients of 12 key steps for healthy contact lens wear. These include: do not use tap water, or any other water, on your lenses or lens case, leave your lenses off if your eyes don’t feel good, look good and see well, and consult your practitioner without delay, replace the lens case with a new one every month and avoid wearing your lenses for swimming unless using goggles, or wear single-use lenses and discard them after swimming.

The handout is designed to act as a patient education tool which optometrists and contact lens opticians can use when discussing contact lens compliance with their patients at each aftercare visit.

“Whether your contact lens patient has been wearing contact lenses for 20 years, or has just started to enjoy their many benefits, there is always a need to remind them of the basic steps that need to be taken to ensure safe and healthy vision,” said BCLA president, Dr Catharine Chisholm.

As well as the 12 key steps, the handout has a box where BCLA members can fill in each patient’s lens replacement frequency, recommended solution and date for next contact lens check. There is also space for a practice stamp.

Commenting on the new resource, BCLA Fellow professor Lyndon Jones, who is director of the Centre for Contact Lens Research, based at the University of Waterloo, Canada, said: “Non-compliance by contact lens wearers is a significant risk factor for microbial keratitis, infiltrates and discomfort. I am convinced that the use of a checklist such as the one developed by the BCLA will greatly assist its members in educating patients about the safest way to wear and care for their lenses.”
The checklist has been sent to all full BCLA members. Online (affiliate) members can download it from the members’ area of the website, www.bcla.org.uk, under ‘factsheets’.