Allied Ophthalmic Personnel

Training of allied ophthalmic personnel can make a major contribution to improving access to eye care around the world, particularly in low-resource settings where there is a shortage of ophthalmic specialists. Allied ophthalmic personnel may be characterized by different educational requirements, legislation and practice regulations, skills, and scope of practice between countries and even within a given country. Typically, allied ophthalmic personnel comprise opticians, ophthalmic nurses, orthoptists, ophthalmic and optometric assistants, ophthalmic and optometric technicians, vision therapists, ocularists, ophthalmic photographer/ imagers, and ophthalmic administrators, among others. The curricula are presented not as mandatory standards of training or practice, but as an educational tool and consensus example to stimulate multi-levels of training including basic, standard, and advanced programs. The ICO notes the wide variability of educational standards, patterns and prevalence of diseases, and social structures for provision of eye care in geographic regions and encourages continuous modification of these curricula according to the needs of different global communities.