Jack Persico

1 week ago | reviewofoptometry.com | Jack Persico

When you first identify a medical condition in a patient, you’re usually met with two strong emotions simultaneously: pride in your clinical acumen and, perhaps, anxiety over how to proceed. Suddenly, you’re on the hook to make a whole lot of judgment calls on the patient’s behalf. Should they begin therapy? If so, with what? How soon and how often should they be seen for follow-up? What criteria should you use to gauge success or failure of the treatment?

1 month ago | reviewofoptometry.com | Jack Persico

Another day, another Ozempic article. Ever since last summer, when JAMA Ophthalmology published worrisome findings showing an increased risk of NAION in patients using semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, additional studies have been coming fast and furious—and they often contradict each other. Here’s a timeline to catch you up. In July 2024, Harvard researchers published an observational study involving 555 patients taking semaglutide for either weight loss or diabetes.

2 months ago | reviewofoptometry.com | Jack Persico

Looking back through the array of topics we explored in last month’s special issue on trends and transformations in optometry, I see many threads of conversation worth continuing this year and beyond. Some are a given. Scope of practice expansion is rewriting optometry’s mandate, bringing in new responsibilities for ODs to address and absorb. We’d be remiss if we didn’t track it further.

Jan 15, 2025 | reviewofoptometry.com | Jack Persico

So much of optometry’s identity at any given moment is bound up in its schools and colleges. They repopulate the profession and allow it to grow. They set the values and principles that practitioners bring to their careers. They help optometry deliver on the promise of scope expansion. With about 1,800 new graduates entering the field every year, the schools represent an engine of change that continually reshapes the character of the profession.

Jan 15, 2025 | reviewofoptometry.com | Jack Persico

Most of the content in Review of Optometry focuses on explaining the clinical skills needed to practice at the highest level possible, today and tomorrow. As you well know, that’s a tall order for a profession with such a sprawling mandate. Of course, clinical care doesn’t happen in a vacuum. There are countless forces at work that either support it or thwart it.