2006 Luxottica-Funded Projects

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Since 2004, Luxottica Group has provided funding for dozens of state-based healthy vision programs through the Healthy Eyes Healthy People™ State Association Grant Program.

ALABAMA

Vision Care for Homeless Persons in Birmingham

This project includes four visual health evaluation events over a period of one year at the Firehouse Shelter. The visual health evaluation will include the following items: case history, visual acuity (corrected, distance and near), intraocular pressure, external examination, ophthalmoscopic examination, refractive examination, spectacle selection and fitting (if appropriate) and case presentation. Interns and faculty from the University of Alabama (UAB) School of Optometry would perform the visual health evaluation in concert with volunteers from collaborating agencies and groups. We estimate that approximately 150 homeless persons would take part in each health evaluation event for a total of 600 persons. The project collaborators with UAB School of Optometry include the Metropolitan Birmingham Services for the Homeless, the Alabama Lions Sight Conservation Association, the City Action Partnership and the Old Firehouse Shelter.

ARIZONA

The AZ State Braille and Talking Book Library's Recording Studio Conversion Project

The library provides FREE service to any eligible Arizona resident unable to read print due to a visual impairment, blindness OR physical disability. Conversion from analog cassettes to digitial technology will not only provide superior sound quality, but increased ease of use, options and durability. The Library’s new studio will produce books, magazines and other materials requested by patrons; duplicate titles recorded elsewhere; and convert all of the previously recorded analog items. The project collaboration includes the Arizona State Library, Archives and Public Records, and the Arizona Optometric Charitable Foundation.

CALIFORNIA

Serving the Un-Served

The California Optometric Association will partner with the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and with six local societies to Serve the Un-Served. The target population is 80 percent Latino, 10 percent Asian, 5 percent African-American and 5 percent Caucasian. The project director will meet with society leaders in the five cities and recruit doctors in each of these cities. The project director will also work with an optometric equipment manufacturer to secure the necessary diagnostic equipment for each community diabetes screening event. The project director will work with ADA office in each city to ensure that each screening is well attended. Relationships with community clinics and low-vision clinics will be established to provide follow-up care. h The California Vision Project will provide follow-up exams and appliances. Press Releases will be sent to the media about the screenings and their importance and optometrists will be available to talk.

Sight for Life

Sight for Life will be a component of the Boys & Girls Club of Brawley Fitness for Life Program, which empowers young people through education, activity and healthy nutrition to break the sedentary cycle that leads to obesity, diabetes and diabetic retinopathy, cardiovascular disease and compromised lives. Sight for Life will be a public education campaign that will include the development of brochures, advertising and a public education process. The Healthy Eyes Healthy People™ grant would help pay for the development of brochures, advertising and Boys & Girls staff time to publicize and educate the community at large about the Sight for Life program’s goals of reducing visual impairment due to diabetes and the importance of using protective eyewear while engaging in recreational and sports activities. The project collaboration includes the Boys and Girls Club of Brawley, the City of Brawley’s Parks and Recreation Office, the Brawley Lions Club and the Vision Care Center of Southeastern California.

CONNECTICUT

KidSight Connecticut

The project will provide posters and brochures to local schools and day cares. Optometrists will visit their local school nurses and pediatricians to educate them on the importance of eye examinations and the capabilities of optometrists to provide these services. Brochures will also be provided to libraries, prenatal centers and obstetric offices to educate expectant mothers on the importance of eye examinations before one year of age.

New moms will receive eye care information through the Department of Public Health’s Childhood Wellness Packets. We will provide Children’s Vision 1,3,5 brochures to CT Department of Public Health for distribution in their new parent infant health package which is distributed to new moms in Connecticut

FLORIDA

The Heiken Children's Vision Fund

The Heiken Children’s Vision Fund has been the major, daily countywide not-for-profit charitable organization dedicated to providing free comprehensive eye examinations and eyeglasses to all children grades K through 12 that lack financial means or insurance to pay for them. The focus of the project is two-fold: eye health and eye safety. The project is designed to increase community awareness of the importance of preventative vision and eye health exams and to provide those services to those who need it most. Through the unique Instant-Vision program, a fully equipped mobile “optometric office” comes to a school and provides a full array of comprehensive eye health and vision services. All students must qualify for Federal Free or Reduced school meals and lack Medicaid, Healthy Kids, or private insurance that covers vision care. The Heiken Fund provides services through the In-Office and Instant Vision Programs. Prescribed eyeglasses are dispensed on site by a licensed optician. The Fund’s affiliation with Jeppesen VisionQuest provides all of the eyeglasses for the Heiken Children’s Vision Fund programs.

IDAHO

Improvement of Eye Health in the Disadvantaged Population

The project director will set up eye screenings to be conducted by optometrists throughout the state of Idaho. These screenings will be used to educate the population abut the need for regular eye examiniations. The project director will also coordinate the distribution of educational material to schools, homeless shelters, and public health nurses. The project collaborators include the Community Oasis Outreach Mission, the Idaho-Eastern Oregon Lions Sight & Hearing Foundation, Inc. and the State of Idaho Department of Special Education.

ILLINOIS

Illinois School for Visual Impairment, Pediatric Low Vision Clinic, Jacksonville, IL

This project is a semiannual onsite downstate pediatric low vision service for thirty years. The clinic provides free pediatric low vision examination services, glasses and low vision devices for children throughout the state, primarily from downstate areas and for children who are residents at the state school for children with vision impairment in Jacksonville, the Illinois School for Visually Impaired (ISVI). Supervising faculty, pediatric and low vision residents from the Illinois College of Optometry and residents from the West Side VA Hospital in Chicago provide the professional examination services. The project also receives support from the Lions of Illinois Foundation. The project collaborators include the Illinois School for the Visually Impaired, the Veterans Affairs Edward Hines Hospital and the Illinois Eye Institute.

IOWA

What to Look For

The project will educate parents about their child’s visual development by collaborating with Iowa hospitals and coordinating the distribution of What to Look For brochures that the Iowa Optometric Association has developed. The brochures will also be distributed to OD’s offices to hand out to their patients to help get the same message out within the community. There are 109 hospitals in Iowa. We currently have contact information at 31 of those hospitals. We will contact those hospitals first to present the brochure and ask for their assistance in distributing it to parents in their communities (Phase 1). Phase 2 will involve initiating contact with those hospitals where we don’t have contact people about the distribution of the brochure. Phase 3 includes contacting those other entitites in the state that work with children birth to age 3, i.e. Early Head Start, Department of Education, Child Health Specialty Clinics and Community Health Centers. Because of the Hispanic population in Iowa (approximately 3 percent), we will also develop a Spanish version of the brochure.

KENTUCKY

Kentucky Vision Project

The Kentucy Vision Project (KVP) will produce an informational brochure with an attached application informing the public of the availability of free eye examinations and glasses for those who meet certain financial criteria. The project director will work with a professional layout and design artist to make up the brochure and application form; negotiate and oversee the printing of the materials; work with collaborative agencies on distribution channels; ensure delivery of materials to appropriate locations; monitor number of applicants as a result of the information outreach and tabulate the number of people receiving free eye exams and treatment from the project. The Kentucky Vision Project is a year round program with a full time staff person, over 150 committed optometrists to do volunteer eye exams on a weekly basis. The program is supported by free lab work from ophthalmic labs, frames from manufacturers and needed follow-up medical care from co-management clinics. Collaborators include the Growing Place, the Kentucky Department for Community Based Services and the Salvation Army.

LOUISIANA

Faith in Wellness

Three months post-Katrina (December 1, 2005) FEMA registration figures indicated that 162,742 displaced residents are now considered residents of the Greater Baton Rouge area. Currently, 2,250 people are living in a FEMA trailer community known as Renaissance Village with another 2,500 living in area hotels scheduled to move into the community within the next several months. Most, if not all, of the displaced people have extremely limited health care options. Faith in Wellness proposes to solve one of their heatlh care issues - vision care.

Faith in Wellness, a program started by the Optometry Association of Louisiana four years ago, has been an “on-site” glaucoma screening program using volunteer optometrists to provide the expertise. It is our intention to move Faith in Wellness to the Renaissance Village once a week until we have screened all 5,000 residents for glaucoma. VSP has maintained a vision clinic at this location; however, it is our intention to fill in the gaps that may exist, plus take our services to other FEMA trailer villages in the area known as Airport 1, 2, 2b, and 3. Since we believe and experts have confirmed that the temporary housing situation will last a minimum of 18 months, we will move our screening services to the West Bank/Algiers area once we have screened those in the Greater Baton Rouge area. Project partners include the Louisiana Primary Care Association, the Louisiana Health Care Review and the Capitol Area Human Services District.

MARYLAND

Maryland Optometric Association (MOA) Senior Vision Awareness Campaign

By participating in the state and local county senior health fairs, the MOA Senior Vision Awareness Campaign aims to educate its seniors and their health care providers about the need for routine dilated eye exams to detect, prevent and treat visually-debilitating eye diseases, such as diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma, macular degeneration and cataracts. At these health fairs, we will provide visual acuity screening. We will have vision simulators that mimic these eye conditions for participants to wear to fully understand the effect these vision conditions have. We will provide prescriptive low vision devices so that the participants may understand what they are, how they enhance limited vision and how they differ from generic or drugstore devices. Lastly, we will educate the participants about these eye conditions with handouts and posters. The state health fair, the Governor’s Conference on Vital Aging II, takes place on May 2, 2006, at the Baltimore Convention Center. Modified to a smaller scale, the local county fair will be held at local counties, with the individual dates to be determined after the successful completion of the state fair. The project will partner with the Maryland Department of Aging.

MICHIGAN

Visually Impaired Program Enhancing Rehabilitation (V.I.P.E.R.)

The project will increase public awareness in these areas:

Enhancing remaining vision with the use of low vision aids or adaptive devices. Low vision specialists will be identified throughout the State of Michigan who may help enhance vision and increase the skills required for the utilization of remiaing eye sight. Project Director (PD) will coordinate referrals to low vision specialists.
Agencies exist that may assist in improving activities of daily living and help in learning blind skills. Agencies will be identified with appropriate referrals by PD.
Eye care practitioners throughout the state will be educated and notified that speical low vision services are available with mailings generated by the PD.

The project collaborators include the Michigan Commission for the Blind and the Greater Detroit Agency for the Blind and Visually Impaired.

NEBRASKA

Children's Vision Public Service Campaign

Nebraska Optometric Association (NOA) intends to partner with the Nebraska Foundation for Children’s Vision (NFCV) and Lamar Advertising Company to place outdoor advertising throughout the state. Lamar Advertising has agreed to donate billboard space and provide production and placement at public service rates in order to enable NOA and NFCV to maximize our exposure. In order to facilitate consumer identification with the message and consumer ability to respond, billboards will be placed in communities in which an NOA member optometrist practices and the planned campaign will include 70 percent of the communities across the state where ODs practice. We anticipate placing the advertising in April. The project director will work with Lamar to coordinate development and placement of the billboards, and will coordinate communication with optometrists statewide to advise them of the placements in their communities and how to leverage the exposure from this advertising.

NEW JERSEY

Camden Eye Center Healthy Vision Summer Program 2006

The Camden Eye Center (CEC) has provided HEALTHY VISION SUMMER Program for seven years. Each summer the CEC Mobile Vision Clinic is deployed to 20 neighborhood sites in Camden City. Approximately 500 children ages one through 17 years of age receive vision and eye health screenings and/or comprehensive eye examinations.

In 2006 it is anticipated that the HEALTHY VISION SUMMER Program will visit 20 neighborhood sites and provide screening services for another 500 children; follow-up comprehensive examinations and prescription ophthalmic eye wear will be provided for 220 children.

NEW YORK

Let's See, The Right Start to Lifelong Healthy Vision

The “Let’s See” project has the goal of increasing the number of pre-school aged children who receive a vision screening exam and eye safety information. The National Eye Institute VIP Study indicates that approximately 1/3 of children with vision disorders are not identified by vision screening. Although some states have mandated that children receive comprehensive eye examinations, New York State has not. Therefore, the children in our country at greatest risk for vision disorders remain unidentified. The “Let’s See” project will identify many of these children and ensure that they are evaluated by an optometrist. To that end, the director will partner with the Chautauqua Blind Association to provide outreach publicity and volunteer coordination for the project. Activities will include volunteer training and scheduling of pre-school vision screenings and eye safety educational sessions at pre-school programs. The program will encourage regular eye examinations by professionals for both children and their parents.

OREGON

Children's Vision Foundation (CFV) Vision Screening Program

The Children’s Vision Foundation (CFV) is conducting comprehensive vision screenings on children in central and eastern Oregon. The screening battery we use is a modified version of the New York State Optometric Association (NYSOA) battery. The screening checks each student’s distance and near acuity, hyperopia, fusion, near point convergence, and tracking. Rescreens are done on students who have problems in one or more areas of screening to verify their results and limit the amount of false positives. Once verified, student’s results are shared with their families and schools, encouraging them to get a professional exam. The program collaborates with community groups, school districts, the Youth Challenge program, Family Advocates Network coordinators, school district nurses and parents.

VisionQuest Oregon

The project has developed an educational pamphlet on the importance of eye care for children. The pamphlet will be available in English and Spanish and will be distributed to each public elementary school in the state of Oregon. The pamphlet will be intended for parents and guardians of elementary school-age children. Included in each pamphlet will be an application form for no-cost insurance programs in order to provide children access to eye care regardless of economic means. The project will revamp the educational packet to include activity brochures from the South Dakota VisionQuest program. The new pamphlet will be distributed to 940 elementary schools in the state of Oregon in both English and Spanish. The program collaborates with the Oregon School Nurses Associaton and the Oregon chapter of Volunteer Optometric Services to Humanity.

PENNSYLVANIA

Increasing the Use of Rehabilitation Services and Adaptive Devices by Persons with Visual Impairments

Using information from the 2004 and 2005 Low Vision Survey, the Pennsylvania Optometric Association (POA) will collaborate with the Pennsylvania Association for the Blind (PAB) to develop procedures to increase intraprofessional and interprofessional referral patterns and awareness of low vision rehabilitation service options available through the collaborative partners. The project will fund the development and printing of referral forms for use by PAB agencies to increase the use of rehabilitation services by persons with visual impairment.

RHODE ISLAND

Save Your Vision Campaign

The project director will oversee a spring television advertising campaign to promote the new vision examination law, scheduled to be implemented in September 2006. The current Governor of Rhode Island will be the person delivering the public service announcement using himself as example of a child whose lazy eye was not detected until long after effective treatment was an option. The project director will communicate with the Director of Health of Rhode Island regarding the project and plans for an Internet based monitoring system to measure the effectiveness of the new law. The project director will secure a production company and public relations firm to place the public service announcements in the most effective times to gain exposure to young parents. The Rhode Island Department of Health is a partner for this project.

SOUTH DAKOTA

Vision Quest

Vision Quest has already developed and distributed educational materials in a kit format to every pre-kindegarten to grade 8 classroom teacher in South Dakota. The project director has contacted by mail every pre-kindergarten through grade 8 and select grade 9 to 12 South Dakota teachers making available new activity ideas and lesson plans as a mailed kit or downloadable file from a web address.

A postcard mailing to 9,500 targeted teachers will be completed in early 2006. An email message to all teachers will be sent in conjunction with the beginning of the school year reminding them of the VQ materials and making printed copies available upon request. An article will be submitted to the newsletter of the South Dakota Educators Association highlighting the information in Vision Quest. The governor of South Dakota sent a letter to all South Dakota school teachers urging them to partner with optometrists of the South Dakota Optometric Society in this project.

VIRGINIA

Diabetes Awareness Project

The project aims to develop a presentation (both in slide and power point format) for optometrists to use in educating the general public about diabetes and its ocular effects. The project will partner with the Virginia Free Clinic Association, to educate the healthcare providers about the level of care that optometrists can provide to diabetic patients. The project will establish a volunteer network of optometrists statewide who will agree to help the Virginia Association of Free Clinics to provide dilated eye screenings for the working poor during National Diabetes Awareness Month.

WEST VIRGINIA

Quality through Collaboration in Rural Diabetes Care: Enhancing Intraprofessional Referrals through PPOD (Pharmacy, Podiatry, Optometry, and Dentistry) Primary Care Model - A Centers for Disease Control and National Institutes of Health-National Diabetes

The proposed health education/health promotion project to develop a Pharmacy, Podiatry, Optometry, and Dentistry (PPOD) Diabetes Study Group in a three-county area of central West Virginia is based on a primary care team approach to the complications of diabetes model developed by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) - National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP)-PPOD Work Group. Health education/health promotion program curriculum, posters, power point presentations and other resource materials have been developed, pre-tested, revised and are available for dissemination and public use for projects such as the WV 2006 Healthy Eyes Healthy People™ Grant - Quality through Collaboration in Rural Diabetes Care PPOD Provider Diabetes Study Group. The ultimate goal of the Study Group project is to increase interprofessional referrals among primary care providers resulting in improved quality of care for those individuals with diabetes, including increased number of individiuals with diabetes receiving annual dilated eye examinations.

WYOMING

Vision Learning CD

The WOA will develop a “Vision Learning” CD that will have learning/teaching exercises for different grade levels (K-5) that teachers or school nurses may use to teach about the eye and the vision process. WOA will coordinate with the Wyoming Department of Education and the Wyoming School Nurses Association to notify teachers and school nurses about the availability of the “Vision Learning” CD and related materials. The WOA will provide to all Wyoming optometrists upon request copies of the “Vision Learning” CD. Optometrists will be encouraged to assist teachers in providing education about eye and vision using the CD and other provide tools. WOA will purchase and provide to any requesting school nurse or teacher copies of the AOA “Journey Through Your Eyes” CD, “Be Wise” CD, and Comic Books and other learning tools. WOA will launch the above materials as well as brochures regarding the recommended frequency of eye exams for children, posters, and information about the scope of optometry services at the Wyoming School Nurses Association spring, 2006 meeting.