Thursday Night - ICO Tour de Optometry Presentation

Dear ICO Students and Faculty,

I'm very much looking forward to making the trek to Chicago and seeing you all on Thursday night, December 3rd!  I have lectured to several schools around the country but love coming to ICO... my last being May 2006. COVD initiated this lecture series, to reach out to every College of Optometry in the US, Canada and Puerto Rico in order to help the future of Optometry, the students, be aware of the critical importance of developmental, binocular vision care and vision therapy for the patients that you will serve.

I really like the above photo, which was taken during my trip to NOVA (2007), at which time I was not only able to lecture but participate in the binocular vision lab. We all had a lot of fun!

During this Thursday's visit, I will be sharing with you some insights and important elements to know in your future optometric care of your patients. NO this will not be a boring lecture! This will be stuff that I hope you will find extremely relevant, interesting and yes, we will have some fun too! What's more COVD will be buying dinner! Hey, now that is such a deal!!

On this blog site, I am hoping to pique your interest in the presentation plus have a little dialog.

Prior to Thursday's visit, I am very interested in hearing from you. Now, I realize you are very busy and you don't need "one more thing" to do. But, if you would have a moment between hitting the books and clinic, please leave a comment. From a general stand point, what are your primary interests and or concerns for your future patient care? By that I mean, what aspect of patient care do you feel will be the most gratifying and what area are you most concerned about? Even though you will receive an outstanding education at ICO, do you have any questions or concerns about the area of binocular vision or vision therapy? Is this an area you would like to provide to your patients or do you want to "leave it to someone else"?  I would especially like to know if there is anything you would like me to be sure to include in this presentation?

So, with that in mind, please leave comments.

I look forward to seeing you all in just a few days!

Dr. F.

Dan L. Fortenbacher, O.D., FCOVD

Past President, COVD

Comments

[Naghmeh Thompson]

Hello Dr. Fortenbacher!

I was wondering how involved are the optometrists who provide vision therapy in their practice. Do optometric assistants tend do that? Also, could you briefly talk about the procedure for Canadian optometrists to be certified as VT providers. Thank you and I look forward to your presentation on Thursday.

[Nathan Goldberg]

Dr. F,

I am looking forward to your talk and was wondering how much vision therapy we might learn in school, and how and where to learn enough to put it into practice after we graduate.

[Marisha Spence-Roberts]

Hi,
I am interested in vision therapy and I want to practice in an inner city neighborhood because I believe a lot of these children are missed diagnosed with learning disabilities.I was wondering if you could talk about the process of becoming a fellow in the college of vision development.

[Dr. Fortenbacher]

Very good questions and thanks for asking. A common thread running through each question is how to acquire the advanced training to be ready to provide VT(if you chose to add this to your practice). Plus how can you organize your practice so that the delivery of care results in not only in efficacious results for the patient, but also is efficient. Yes, I will be explaining how this can be done PLUS how to become a Fellow of COVD!

I look forward to seeing you there!