Ten Years After: A Decade of SECO Conferences
Optometry Advisor
Empowering primary eye care physicians with practice-focused and comprehensive clinical and drug information.
I just attended my tenth annual SECO International conference. That’s a decade of scaling the Georgia World Conference Center’s multiple flights. Well, except that one terrible year in quarantine and that one wonderful year in New Orleans.
Ten years worth of SECO memories. I met Art Epstein, OD, there, who we lost in 2022, and who kindly took the time out of his busy day to introduce me to many of the ODs I’d rely on for a crash course in optometry for years to come. I was there in 2020, when half the conference didn’t show up. I flew home that Monday just in time for my last week of working in an office.
Even assuming a year of residency, newly graduated optometrists would have been in high school the first year I attended this thing. And in all that time, the only things I’ve really learned is that A) change is the only constant, and B) people who dismiss what can be achieved through medical research are almost always wrong.
Someone once told me that the reason optometrists needed to expand their scope of practice was because they couldn’t make a living prescribing glasses and contacts anymore. Implicit within that comment is the suggestion that prescription glasses and contacts were the last word in myopia treatments, at least until a patient opted for an out-of-pocket refractive surgery.
At that time, pivotal trials into myopia management techniques with atropine and Ortho-K lenses had already been conducted, but had not made their way into many practices. Novel myopia control spectacles had not yet been developed. This year, one of SECO’s three “hot topic” presentations focused on myopia management. The talk relied on the expertise of researcher Katherine K. Weise OD, who detailed the challenges the field faces as well as the potential it presents. I was particularly interested in guest speaker Debbie Jones , FCOptom, a clinical professor at the University of Waterloo School of Optometry & Vision Science/Waterloo Eye Institute in Ontario. Canadian optometrists have access to some technologies that Americans do not, and Dr Jones’s presentation felt like a tour through the near future of optometry. Think of this article as a travelog of that tour.
As for scope expansion, research presented at the conference’s keynote session showed how artificial intelligence is opening up whole new avenues of optometric care. From autorefractors to predictive imaging, AI powered technologies could be just the armory optometrists need in an era of increasing eye disease prevalence.
We’re also providing a starter’s guide for an optometrist’s role in referring patients with mild to moderate glaucoma for MIGS procedures. And, we’re looking into how technologies are offering new patch-free options for amblyopia treatments.
Of course, these are all just new tools of the trade. The real magic is in optometrists' commitment to continuing education. Ongoing training in the nuances of human health are what keep ODs in control when, for example, a patient appears with elevated intraocular pressure, and a history of asthma. Can you explain why it matters? Play our interactive quiz and let us know how you fare.
And next time SECO comes around, look me up. I’ve got a decade’s worth of Atlanta recommendations for you.
— Bill Kekevian (Editor of Optometry Advisor & Ophthalmology Advisor )
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