Symposium showcases success of collaborative eye care models

In 2021, Optometry Australia released Working Together for Better Eye Care, a collective call to action for optometrists to work collaboratively with other health professionals to deliver better eye care for all Australians, particularly our senior citizens, the economically, socially and geographically disadvantaged, and First Nations peoples.

Since then, Optometry Australia and its state affiliates have been working with the federal and state and territory governments, health professional organisations, and consumer representatives advocating for the broad rollout of collaborative care models that enhance patient access, reduce out-of-pocket costs and drive greater efficiency in the health system.

Optometrists from around Australia and New Zealand are already successfully working with ophthalmologists and other health professionals delivering collaborative eye care that is making a demonstrable difference for patients with a range of eye health conditions.

Last month, Optometry Australia convened a Collaborative Care Symposium to enable optometrists to share their experiences, learn from each other, and provide insights into how their collaborative care models could be rolled out more broadly across the health system.

CEO of Optometry Australia, Skye Cappuccio made clear that it is time to press the go button on driving collaborative eye care into the mainstream health system.

‘There is a growing consensus that the siloed approach to healthcare does not deliver for patients, health professionals or the health system. Eye care is a prime example of where collaborative care delivers better and more timely treatment for patients by utilising the skills of optometrists as eye health professionals and reducing duplication, waste and delay in the system,’ Ms Cappuccio said.

‘Collaborative eye care works in hospital and community settings, in cities, regional centres and remote locations, and for patients with the most common chronic eye health conditions. Independent evaluations have clearly demonstrated that collaborative eye care delivers enhanced patient outcomes and lower health system costs,’ Ms Cappuccio said.

The Symposium included presentations from optometrists who are delivering collaborative eye care across a range of geographies and patient groups, and from software providers whose systems are aiming to address the barriers of clinical information transfer that are impacting the ability to integrate collaborative eye care into the broader health system.

Participants discussed the key barriers to scalable change and how they can be overcome.  They agreed to continue working with Optometry Australia, its state affiliates and with each other, to enable the broader rollout of collaborative eye care models in the health system.

The Symposium acknowledged the recent work of the federal and state and territory governments in embracing multidisciplinary team-based care and supporting successful collaborative eye care projects.

Participants set a goal of embedding collaborative eye care models into mainstream health delivery and agreed that this would require system change, stakeholder engagement, buy-in from the profession, funding and regulatory certainty, reform of clinical pathways, digital enablement, and continuing evaluation.

Importantly, they committed to providing leadership and practical support to enable the optometry profession to embrace the opportunities for collaborative care and building stronger alliances with patient groups and other health professions.

They also agreed to use existing exemplars of collaborative eye care to develop broader system-wide collaborative eye care models for the purposes of future advocacy and implementation.

A list of the participants at the Symposium is below:

Australian Capital Territory

• Mei Ying Boon
• Faran Sabeti

New South Wales

• Paula Katalanic
• Lisa Keay
• Joe Nazarian
• Dean Powrie
• William Trinh
• Colina Waddell
• Michael Yapp

New Zealand

• Richard Johnson
• Debra So

Queensland

• Sharon Bentley (apology)
• Jason Holland
• Jim Loughridge (apology)
• Fiona Moore
• Ann Webber

South Australia

• Thi-Thi Nguyen (apology)
• Claire Ong
• Jacqui Warren (apology)

Tasmania

• Lee Baumwol (apology)
• Damon Hannay
• Lisa Kingshott

Victoria

• Nellie Deen
• Lyn Hsieh
• Andrew Huhtanen
• Vianh Huynh

Western Australia

• Alex Craig
• Allison McKendrick

Industry Presentations:

• James Manners, Pliny
• Lachlan Wheeler, Topcon

Optometry Australia

• Skye Cappuccio, Chief Executive Officer
• Ben Hamlyn, Optometry Development Manager
• David Quilty, Consultant, National Advisory