This Marketing Tip comes from our friends at Mirro, Inc. Optometry Consultants. You can view their webpage for more marketing tips and as always, don't forget to check opticXpress.com for help with your optometric billing!
Luxury Is Key: When Dispensing
When dispensing frames and/or lenses to a patient, it is important that your staff presents the product in a manor that displays luxury. During your presentation, dispense items in jewelry trays (that contain a felt or leather base), not in plastic “job” trays. Present the customer with a cleaning cloth, a case (even if dispensing a patient’s own frame), a spray cleaner, and a nice bag where your practice’s logo is displayed. Even if you don’t sell high-end eye wear, you can still present a high-end experience that your patient’s will love.
opticXpress is an optometric billing company that provides a clearinghouse, billing service and software strictly for optometrists.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Optometric Billing Dry Eye-Grow Your Practice
Pulled this from our friends at Noble Vision Group
"Research shows that artificial tears, although beneficial, appear to be palliative and there is no evidence that they can treat the inflammation in dry eye disease. Doctors that want to build this part of their medical practice need to employ the use of medications that target the disease.
Articifial tears such as Systane, Optive, Blink, Theratears, Soothe, Refresh, Genteal etc. are a good starting place in the management of mild dry eye but may not be a sound treatment strategy alone for active disease. For example, in the phase III clinical trials for cyclosporine A 0.05% (Restasis) there were two treatment arms: one that recieved cyclosporine and one that received the vehicle, which turned out to be one of the best artificial tears available known as Endura a few years ago. When biopsy’s were performed on patient’s conjunctival tissue after six months of treatment the group treated with cyclosporine had less T-cells measured showing an improvement in the inflammation associated with the disease. However the group treated with the artificial tears alone (Endura BID + Refresh PRN) showed an increase in inflammatory T-Cells of over 39%!
This is probably why doctors that TREAT the dry eye with targeted treatment options seem to grow their medical practices faster as opposed to simply providing an artificial tear samples alone. Gallup pole data shows that most patients had already tried 3-5 artificial tears before seeing an eye doctor and yet over 70% of doctors put that patient on another artificial tear. No wonder they are seeking new practitioners.
Now, as I stated, I do begin all treatments with an artificial tear alone in mild cases, or in addition to targeted treatments. So when should a doctor consider targeted treatments such as Restasis and steroids such as Lotemax, which effectively target the dry eye disease?
There are three times I would consider the need for targeted treatments such as Lotemax and Restasis. If a patient is on a good artificial tear (as opposed to drops with BAK such as Visine or ClearEyes) and you see ANY of the following:
• The patient has dry eye symptoms including dryness, grittiness, burning, stinging, foreign body sensation, transient blurred vision, redness, irritation, epiphora etc.
• The patient shows signs such as corneal or conjunctival staining or an osmolarity reading above 308mOsmol/L
• The patient when using an artificial tear does not feel that the symptoms resolve for more than 4 hours or requires 4 or more drops per day.
All of these indicate that there is likely some degree of underlying inflammation or unprotected areas of the ocular surface and that warrants a more targeted treatment approach."
-Dr. Paul Karpecki
As always, opticXpress is your one stop for all your optometric billing and procedural needs!
"Research shows that artificial tears, although beneficial, appear to be palliative and there is no evidence that they can treat the inflammation in dry eye disease. Doctors that want to build this part of their medical practice need to employ the use of medications that target the disease.
Articifial tears such as Systane, Optive, Blink, Theratears, Soothe, Refresh, Genteal etc. are a good starting place in the management of mild dry eye but may not be a sound treatment strategy alone for active disease. For example, in the phase III clinical trials for cyclosporine A 0.05% (Restasis) there were two treatment arms: one that recieved cyclosporine and one that received the vehicle, which turned out to be one of the best artificial tears available known as Endura a few years ago. When biopsy’s were performed on patient’s conjunctival tissue after six months of treatment the group treated with cyclosporine had less T-cells measured showing an improvement in the inflammation associated with the disease. However the group treated with the artificial tears alone (Endura BID + Refresh PRN) showed an increase in inflammatory T-Cells of over 39%!
This is probably why doctors that TREAT the dry eye with targeted treatment options seem to grow their medical practices faster as opposed to simply providing an artificial tear samples alone. Gallup pole data shows that most patients had already tried 3-5 artificial tears before seeing an eye doctor and yet over 70% of doctors put that patient on another artificial tear. No wonder they are seeking new practitioners.
Now, as I stated, I do begin all treatments with an artificial tear alone in mild cases, or in addition to targeted treatments. So when should a doctor consider targeted treatments such as Restasis and steroids such as Lotemax, which effectively target the dry eye disease?
There are three times I would consider the need for targeted treatments such as Lotemax and Restasis. If a patient is on a good artificial tear (as opposed to drops with BAK such as Visine or ClearEyes) and you see ANY of the following:
• The patient has dry eye symptoms including dryness, grittiness, burning, stinging, foreign body sensation, transient blurred vision, redness, irritation, epiphora etc.
• The patient shows signs such as corneal or conjunctival staining or an osmolarity reading above 308mOsmol/L
• The patient when using an artificial tear does not feel that the symptoms resolve for more than 4 hours or requires 4 or more drops per day.
All of these indicate that there is likely some degree of underlying inflammation or unprotected areas of the ocular surface and that warrants a more targeted treatment approach."
-Dr. Paul Karpecki
As always, opticXpress is your one stop for all your optometric billing and procedural needs!
Optometric Billing For Contact Lens Bandage
Over the last few days we have received a few requests to find a more effective method of billing insurance companies for a "contact lens bandage ". To date, many doctors have been submitting a "92070- Fitting of contact lens for disease" but we want to know if there is a better code. We are specifically looking for a code that is more detailed. Maybe there is none maybe we have just been looking in the wrong places but we are relying on your experiences to help us out.
Please contact opticXpress today and share with us. We want to know!
RELATED POSTS:
http://optometricbilling.blogspot.com/2012/02/optometric-billing-billing-for-contact.html
http://optometricbilling.blogspot.com/2012/02/optometric-billing-one-more-way-to-bill.html
Please contact opticXpress today and share with us. We want to know!
RELATED POSTS:
http://optometricbilling.blogspot.com/2012/02/optometric-billing-billing-for-contact.html
http://optometricbilling.blogspot.com/2012/02/optometric-billing-one-more-way-to-bill.html
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