‘Too busy on the computer.’ Computerised Testing Rooms

Computerised testing rooms seem to be the flavour of the month again, with many practitioners insisting that a more streamlined, efficient and effective flow of information will be the outcome – no doubt.

Within one year, I have slowly observed a number of installations in my test room, including a computer, a wireless infrared mouse, a touch screen sensitive monitor, two printers (one of which is dedicated to printing patient prescriptions), an infrared bar code scanner and countless numbers of software up-dates.

Recently, there has been an update of software witihin our group of practices to assist optometrists with data input - this has been designed by optometrists, I am told,  to ‘amalgamate’ what goes on in the testing rooms and to merge data with the rest of the business model – ‘computerisation’.  The age old concept of simple pre-set questions with model answers to hand is not a new idea, but now the technology which makes it one step closer to such a concept is very much here in every sense – was this inevitable?

The user interface allows the optometrist to input any information they wish with regards to open questions. The system simultaneously presents model answers which can be selected from a simple touch of the screen for closed questions - arguably a lot faster than the written format. So are we in danger of turning the routine eye examination into an automated thoughtless process?

Patients often find themselves unable to resist making comments on how much the eye examination seems to have changed, especially amongst the older generation who have witnessed these exponential transformations over the years, often commenting on how, “much more thorough��? and “refined��? our examinations have become.

On the other hand, a patient returned to us last week, having felt that during her previous examination, the optometrist had not listened to her concerns, as they were “too busy on the computer��?.  I then spent a good twenty minutes explaining that the notes my colleague had made on the system were more than thorough and that whilst it may appear that the optometrist is not listening while facing the touch screen monitor and typing away, this is indeed not the case.  The patient agreed with me and after I made it my point to reassure her of her prescription and empathised with her regarding the origins of her initial dissatisfaction, she left smiling.

This reminded me of an excellent optometrist who introduced the computerised system to me whilst I was sitting in on one of his examinations. He made a point of explaining to the patient right from the beginning that he would be using the computer much of the time and that he would be listening to the patient at all times and requested the patients approval.

At the time I thought it was a little strange - but now I realise how important that explanation actually was.

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