A recent study evaluated the vision and ocular care skills of 335 U.S.-based physician assistants (PAs) not specializing in ophthalmology. 23% of the respondents said they participated in eye care by providing patient information, answering questions, and initiating discussions on vision care and ocular health more than once monthly. The average PA experience among all respondents was 10.4 years. More than three-quarters of the respondents said they were trained in vision and ocular care training in and/or outside PA training. Of the 27 participants who received instruction outside of PA school, 40.7% said their training included lectures or continuing medical education (CME), 85.2% cited clinical exposure, 44.4% listed self-directed education or research, and 22.2% cited some other option. None reported receiving non-CME pharmaceutical-provided education. Eye care-involved PAs had much higher odds of reporting greater desired and current skill and ability levels compared with those not involved in eye care in six of eight vision and ocular care domains. The authors suggest the varying skills of PAs outside ophthalmology "can be addressed through further development of vision and ocular care in PA school curricula and development of ongoing PA CME in vision and ocular care."

Read More