Covid-19

Because of the pandemic, practice attendance is now by appointment only, this includes small visits such as adjustments and repairs. We may suggest a telemedicine appointment if the problem can be handled without a visit.

Please arrive on time for your appointment, if you are too early or too late we may not be able to let you in due to patient numbers. If you would like, you can call us when you have parked and wait in your car, we’ll call you when it’s time to head over. When attending the practice we’ll ask you to wear your own face covering which covers your mouth and your nose, as well as hand sanitising after you enter.

You may notice the practice door is now kept locked, this is to control the amount of people in the practice at any one time. A member of staff will open and close the doors for you so you won’t need to touch any door handles.

In order to help keep you as safe as possible we ask that you attend the practice alone unless a carer is needed – just let us know if that is the case. Please don’t bring bags and jackets into the practice, leave them at home or in the car. We’ll give you a tray for things like your mobile phone and keys.

We are all now wearing scrub uniforms and various levels of PPE, beyond the minimum standards required by Public Health England.

Unfortunately, no medical grade transparent face masks exist as yet so if you are hard of hearing and need to lip read, please let the reception team know in your booking email and we will be more than happy to adapt our PPE to accommodate your needs.

You will be contacted by your Optometrist the day before your appointment to check you’re well and to go through the history and symptoms for the examination, which we would normally do on at the appointment. Once in the consulting room you might notice equipment is kept covered, this is to help us maintain a high standard of hygiene.

During the appointment, your Optometrist will be sitting further away than usual and may ask you to resist from talking at times. This isn’t because we don’t enjoy our conversations, it’s simply to do with the controlling the risks to you and the clinician during close proximity procedures.

Because we continually invest in the latest technologies we are able to offer safer alternatives than close up examinations, such as using the Optomap to examine the retina rather than a torch where we almost touch cheek to cheek. We strongly recommend patients accept the option of these technologies in order to minimise risk.

After your appointment, if you need spectacles, Anj will be on hand to help as always. We ask for you not to handle the frames, but simply point to the ones you like and they’ll be brought to you on a tray. If it is safe to do so we may offer to pre-adjust the glasses so we can post them to you – saving you another trip to the practice.

During the pandemic we will be operating on a cashless basis. Please make sure you have a credit card with you, or preferably have Apple Pay or Google Pay set up on your phone for true contactless payment.

Once again as practice attendance is by appointment only, please make sure you get in touch before visiting, otherwise we may not be able to let you in and you’d need to wait outside until it is safe to do so.

We look forward to seeing you at the practice soon.