Eye tests at home

Sam_Alumni · March 2019

I was reading through @Gareth_H 's guest post about accessing healthcare as a disabled person and he said:

"I had my biennial optician’s appointment yesterday. On the drive in, I found myself thinking about the chair I was going to have to transfer myself into and tried to recall the technique I’d used to accomplish this previously. As it turns out, and for the very first time, the optician didn’t ask me to transfer, instead simply telling me to reverse back to where the chair was and take my sight test from there. This was indeed a welcome change, although I did feel like a bit of a cheat during the test, as I was now sat a whole metre closer to the letters I had to read out!
(When) transferring into an optician’s chair for a sight test I always have to mentally prepare myself and psyche myself up beforehand. After all, one wrong move from either myself or my chair, and I’ll need scooping off the floor like an upside down lasagne!"

@Topkitten replied telling us about how you can get eye tests in the home, it wasn't something I had heard of before and so I thought I would have a look into it and share with you all. The following information is from the MyLocalOptician website.

Who can have an NHS Eye examination at home?

Domiciliary visits are only available on the NHS if the patient is unable to visit a community optometrist unaccompanied. They are not available to those who could get to an optometric practice but like the convenience of being tested at home.

It should also be remembered that those patients who are not eligible to have an NHS home visit must pay privately for the service. Therefore, if a patient is able to go out and would normally have an NHS sight test they would have to visit a community optometrist to receive the service or pay privately for both the visit and the eye examination. Practitioners are not allowed to provide an NHS sight test at home if the patient is able to visit a community practice.

To find out if you are eligible to a free eye test, check the NHS website here.

Here is a listing of home visiting opticians: