Australian Optometry Workforce Productivity

There are three productivity models for the Australian Optometry workforce.

The first is the Low Productivity Model. This is the model that has been assumed by the 3 most influential papers on the workforce: Horton et al (2006), Access Economics ( 2006) and Keily et al (2008).

This model assumes a 30 min consult requires an additional 15 mins of admin work to complete. It is my contention that most practitioners do not work according to this model. There may be a few who practice with no other staff to help them. This would be rare.

The Standard Productivity Model see practitioners with the level of admin support and technology that allows them to comfortably see appointments according to a 30 minute schedule.

There is a High Productivity Model where practitioners work to a 20 min appointment schedule. This is possible if an Optometrist has the right kind of admin and clinical support. If a clinical assistant performs auto refraction, fields screen, tonometry and even increasingly these day fundus photography. This working schedule is less common but certainly more common than the low productivity model in my experience.

I have set up a survey on the optometry forum

Results so far:

25% do 20min consults

75% do 30 min consults

0% do 45 min consults

at the moment n=8

Comments by respondents:

"I have at least 1-2 hours fun per day, however most consultations do take 20 min. It is easy to decrease them further though if you have worked in a busy practice before. "


http://optomforum.com.au/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1217296739

Survey has been going 24 hrs: So far it is looking like my assumption is correct.

The recent paper by Keily et al ( 2008) estimates that around 7 million consultations ( give or take) will need to be performed PA by 2031

Australia needs:

on the Low productivity model (10 per day) 50 per week, 2300PA, 3043 Equivalent Full time Optometrists (EFTO's)

on Standard productivity model ( 16 per day) 80 per week, 3680 PA, 1902 EFTO's

on High productivity model (21 per day) 105 per week, 4830 PA, 1449 EFTO's

Keily et al examines all the nuances of supply and demand, but really the amount of variance in the productivity model assumption simply dwarfs all the other variables.

Its the elephant in the room.

The conclusion I draw from the 2005 paper and now the 2008 paper is that there is a huge overcapacity and consequent underemployment of Optometrists in Australia.

So to say that "there are sufficient Optometrists to meet the needs of the Australian population" is of course true but wouldn't it be more accurate to also add "because there is an over supply of Optometrists".