Health benefits of optometrists’ fundus scans are minimal

Background   By law, optometrists have the right to take fundus images of their eye examination clients. So far, it is not known if these images are beneficial or harmful.

Methods   The retrospective material consisted of 75 patients in whom the optometrist had recognized a change in the fundus image and urged to see a doctor. The patients had been then sent from primary care to the ophthalmology clinic. Examinations and treatments as well as diagnoses at the clinic and the cost calculations were collected.

Results   Of the patients in the study, 12 (16%) were found to have an eye disease, but in only one (1%) the finding required further studies, so the clinical significance of the findings remained minor. The results highlighted the difficulty of identifying normal variations. The imaging caused costs to the patients and public sector.

Conclusions   We do not recommend an optometrist’s fundus imaging as a routine examination for eye examination customers without the unit that took the image directly taking care of the necessary follow-up evaluation by an ophthalmologist.