A day as an orthoptist
Your day starts with a woman complaining of double vision since being in a car accident. She is very distressed and is unsteady all the time. It’s up to you to work out which of the eye muscles or nerves have been damaged and how you can get rid of the double vision. You successfully identify the eye muscle that has been trapped by a fracture in the eye socket. The double vision can be fixed with a stick-on prism on the patient’s glasses.
Your next patient is a six-year old boy with a left squint/lazy eye which turns in towards the nose. You check to see if the squint his affecting his vision, measure the size of the squint and make sure the muscles around the eyes are working normally. With your test results, the child can now go on to have surgery to straighten their eyes.
Your care and expertise means both patients have a better quality of life and you feel privileged to have helped in restoring their vision and confidence.
