How many optometrists are in the us

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Wilson, Jim P. There are limited research and substantial uncertainty about the level of eye care utilization in the United States. Our study estimated eye care utilization using, to our knowledge, every known nationally representative, publicly available database with information on office-based optometry or ophthalmology services.

Research Design. US adults aged 18 and older. Self-reported utilization of eye care services. The weighted number of adults seeing or talking with any eye doctor ranges from There were an estimated The definitions and estimates of eye care services vary widely across national databases, leading to substantial differences in national estimates of eye care utilization. These statistics have been widely cited in various reports on the eye care industry, and they have been used to demonstrate that most Americans rely on optometrists for their eye care needs [ 1 — 3 ].

However, the methodology used to generate these estimates is not available in the report, and there is significant uncertainty concerning the true number of eye care services that are being delivered in the US by optometrists, ophthalmologists, or other eye care professionals.

To our knowledge, prior research examining the consistency and validity of current national estimates of eye care utilization across major publicly available healthcare databases does not exist. The uncertainty over utilization relative to the supply of eye care professionals—and thus uncertainty over whether the eye care needs of Americans are being met—has important implications for the creation and funding of programs and policies that impact either utilization or supply in the eye care market.

Our study estimates eye care utilization using every known nationally representative, publicly available database with information on office-based optometry or ophthalmology services. To our knowledge, these databases contain all nationally representative data on office-based eye care utilization that are available to the public in the US.

The NHIS is a national database collecting self-reported data on health and healthcare utilization and other measures using in-person interviews and is managed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC [ 4 ].

In addition to the above databases, we also examined the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System BRFSS , which provides eye care utilization data restricted to adults aged 40 and over in a limited number of states [ 8 ]. We estimated the annual total number and percent of adults aged 18 years and older 40 years and older for BRFSS who utilized eye care services and also the total number of eye care visits for databases providing these data.

Table 1 shows a wide range of definitions and estimates of eye care services. MEPS differentiates between optometrists and ophthalmologists. Total number of visits annually is By comparison, MEPS results suggest that there are about 45 million adults visiting office-based optometrists and ophthalmologists annually, totaling MEPS is the only database providing information on optometry specifically, and it indicates there are NHIS indicated there were Unfortunately, BRFSS collected eye care data for only 11 states in the period —10 and only for persons aged 40 and older.

The weighted percentage of respondents reporting a dilated eye exam This statistic has been widely cited in various reports on the eye care industry. Unfortunately, we were not able to replicate or find information on the origin of this figure.

However, this estimate is high compared to results from the other databases on eye care utilization. The wide range of eye care utilization estimates is likely a function of the variance in question wording see footnotes of Table 1 , but it is also possible that there are differences in survey design and populations studied across the databases. Similarly, there was a 1.

While numbers vary by reporting agency and licensing board, and while there is likely some overlap from ODs who work in more than one state, the WO numbers are derived through a consistent methodology. Why is it so difficult to pinpoint precisely how many ODs there are in the U. For one thing, people move in and out of the profession, and some work in multiple states and multiple locations.

Do you have different numbers? WO searches continually on how to standardize the data presentation on numbers of OD in practice. In and , WO noted 44 percent of ODs in practice were women. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

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