Sheffield opticians invests in 'hospital-quality technology'

Specsavers says the optical coherence tomography will be available for appointments at its Firth Park branch, on Bellhouse Road, from this month.

The machine allows an optician to look deeper into the eyes than ever before and is used for a variety of functions including screening and management of conditions such as age-related macular degeneration, glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy.

Phil Banton, branch optometrist director, said: “This investment gives our team the ability to enhance the services to the local community by identifying and helping to detect or manage conditions, with a level of diagnostic capability which previously would have needed a hospital visit.”

An OCT scan uses light to take more than 1,000 images of the back of your eye and beyond, looking right back to the optic nerve and creating a cross-section view.

‘You can imagine it like a cake – we can see the top of the cake and the icing, but the image produced from an OCT scan slices the cake in half and turns it on its side, so we can see all the layers inside,’ Phil continues. ‘It gives the optician an incredibly accurate picture of your eye and its structures, allowing them to check your eye health.’

‘OCT technology produces such a detailed picture of the structures in the eye that it allows us to identify signs of diseases years earlier than traditional methods. An example of this is glaucoma, which the store’s specialists are trained to spot. Given that nearly half of all sight loss is preventable[1], the sooner we can detect these conditions, the sooner we can help manage them or refer people for treatment.’

A customer’s OCT images will be stored on file so we can help note changes over time – a real benefit to the monitoring of someone’s overall eye health.

An OCT scan is in addition to a normal eye test and can be requested when the appointment is booked or when the customer arrives in store.

To book an eye test at the branch, call 0114 262 6260 or visit specsavers.co.uk/stores/firthpark