Significant growth opportunity seen in presbyopia correction

NEW YORK — Presbyopia correction is a service with "huge" potential for increasing a practice's surgical revenue, according to a practice administrator speaking here.

"What I find most exciting is a real opportunity for revenue enhancement," said Candace S. Simerson, CMPE, COE, president and chief operating officer of Minnesota Eye Consultants PA. "This is a noncovered service, which means we control the fee and payment, and it ensures the ability to provide the service at a profit."

Ms. Simerson discussed potential approaches for practices to increase revenue from cataract and refractive surgical procedures here at the OSN New York Symposium.

She explained, for example, that if 200 of a surgeon's patients each year opt to receive a deluxe, presbyopia-correcting IOL, and the total charge for that procedure is $2,000, that could increase the practice's revenue by $400,000.

Presbyopia affects about 100 million Americans, a large potential market for the range of presbyopia-correction options. Informing patients of all their options — including glasses, contact lenses, monovision LASIK, conductive keratoplasty, monovision IOL and presbyopia-correcting IOL procedures — is crucial, Ms. Simerson noted.

"Find ways to offer them all, and the patient will stay with you as they make different choices," she said. It is also important to document that patients are informed of their options, she added.