Mortimer Hirst Welcomes New Optometrist

Mortimer Hirst is delighted to welcome Optometrist Emilie Langley to the clinical team. Emilie has worked part time for Mortimer Hirst over the past two year and has recently joined us full time. Emilie is a Therapeutically Qualified Optometrist and works from both High Street and St Heliers practices.

Emilie completed a Bachelor of Biomedical Science majoring in Functional Human Biology, studying at the University of Otago. The neurophysiology that Emilie was exposed to during the biomedical degree along with Emilie’s passion for working with and helping people were the driving forces to further study Optometry.

Emilie then completed her second degree, Bachelor of Optometry with Honours and Ocular Therapeutics, from the Department of Optometry and Vision Science (DOVS), University of Auckland.

Emilie tailored her Optometry studies around her interest in myopia progression and Orthokeratology (OrthoK).

In 2011, Emilie was chosen to be part of the Antipodeans Abroad Healthcare Volunteer Team to Nepal. This included Rural Outreach clinics and a 6 week internship at Manipal Teaching Hospital, Optometry and Ophthalmology Department, Pokhara, Nepal.

In 2012, Emilie was awarded a summer studentship scholarship from the New Zealand Association of Optometrists (NZAO) to help further research the theory of myopia progression inhibition, which her results are contributing to a paper that is soon to be published.

In 2014, Emilie was part of a team that completed leading research on OrthoK regression, supervised by Grant Watters and Dr. Wanda Lam, which won a New Zealand College of Optometrists (NZCO) award.

Emilie is a member of the NZAO and the Cornea and Contact Lens Society (CCLS). Emilie has a particular interest in contact lens practice including Ortho-K and ocular therapeutics.

Mortimer Hirst Websites

Mortimer Hirst has a number of professional web sites, we thought we would use this opportunity to share / remind you of them all as listed below:

The Official Mortimer Hirst web site: www.mortimerhirst.co.nz

The Official Mortimer Hirst OrthoK web site, OrthoK is also referred to as :Myopia Control, Orthokeratology, Corneal Refractive Therapy and O.K: www.orthok.co.nz

Optometrist, Contact Lens Specialist and Business Partner Grant Watters professional web site: www.grantwatters.co.nz

Optometrist and Contact Lens Specialist Varny Ganesalingam professional web site: www.varnyganesalingam.co.nz

Optometrist and Contact Lens Specialist Kerry Atkinson professional web site: www.kerryatkinson.co.nz

Optometrist and Contact Lens Specialist Alan Saks professional web site: www.alansaks.co.nz

And finally coming soon is our new web site dedicated to Keratoconus, Mortimer Hirst has specialised in Keratoconus since its inception. This is continued today with our industry leading Optometrists and Contact Lens Specialists: www.mykeratoconus.co.nz

Myopia Control

Myopia control refers to techniques employed by specially trained optometrists to slow or even stop the progression of myopia (“short-sightedness”) in children and teenagers during the growing years. Often myopia is quite genetic, and parents who have gone short sighted themselves as youngsters will bring their children in to ask if anything can be done to “slow things down”? If a child’s prescription can be kept at a lower level, it’s much easier for them later on as adults because they are more suitable for laser surgery, and less likely to suffer from myopic complications such as retinal detachment. There are currently four techniques being used for myopia control:
1) Orthokeratology (“Ortho-K)- this involves sleeping in rigid gas permeable contact lenses at night to re-shape the cornea
2) Specialised multifocal soft lenses worn daily
3) Atropine 0.01% eye drops- still in experimental stages
4) Steeply curved spectacle lenses- have some effect
All these techniques try to achieve the same thing- providing the periphery of the retina with as sharp an image as possible. It has been proven in independent research that a blurred image on the peripheral retina encourages the eyeball to elongate, causing progressive myopia.
At Mortimer Hirst we have been fitting specialised Ortho-K and multifocal lenses for myopia control for the past 4 ½ years, with great success. Most of our children enrolled in these programmes enjoy stable non-deteriorating vision from when they start until 18-20 years old, when the myopia is unlikely to progress further anyway. For more information on these exciting techniques, please contact us for a brochure!

Global Vision

Read Optometrist Alan Saks' www.alansaks.co.nz latest article on eyecare and global trends as recently published in Optician Magazine. It features opinions from international experts in the field including Prof. Brian Holden (Australia), Prof. Kovin Naidoo (South Africa), and Dr Jennifer Craig (New Zealand) and looks at the challenges lying ahead for eyecare professionals around the world. It is the first instalment of a series highlighting the impact of global changes on primary eye care and will include topics such as population growth and demographic changes, climate change and the environment, food issues and economic pressures and globalisation and the spread of technology.

http://www.opticianonline.net/assets/getAsset.aspx?ItemID=6749

Latest news on Ortho-K

Recent research in Sydney has strengthened the evidence that Ortho-K lenses slow down progressive myopia (short-sightedness) in teenage children. These specially shaped rigid lenses are worn overnight to re-shape the cornea in a non-invasive and reversible fashion, to provide clear vision the next day without spectacles or normal contact lenses. They are excellent for correcting mild to moderate myopia up to about -4.00DS, and now with the bonus that we can intervene with deteriorating vision for the first time. Please look at http://www.paragoncrt.com/ for more information.