Albany Spectacle Makers: Optometry on Albany Highway
Albany Spectacle Makers is an optometrist in Albany, at 3 Albany Highway. We provide eye examinations for all ages, fit contact lenses, and make and repair glasses on site. We also see people who need to be looked at quickly — eye injuries, infections and contact lens problems. If you want an appointment, ask for Melissa, Laurie or Camilla on (08) 9842 2677.
Binocular vision dysfunction
One part of our work is not standard at every practice. Dr Andrew Taylor is a neuro-visual optometrist and, as we put it on our own site, has specific training in detecting small amounts of vision misalignment that a routine eye examination does not pick up. Where that misalignment is present, the eye muscles work harder to compensate.
The symptoms we list for it are wider than most people expect. They take in dizziness, light headedness, nausea, unsteadiness or drifting when walking, poor coordination or clumsiness, poor depth perception, motion sickness, headaches and face pain, eye pain or pain with eye movement, neck ache and upper back and shoulder pain, head tilt, anxiety, sensitivity to light and glare, double vision, feeling overwhelmed in crowds or large spaces, fatigue with reading, shadowed, overlapping or blurred vision, difficulty with reading and reading comprehension, skipping lines or losing your place when reading, and closing or covering one eye to make it easier to see. As we put it on the page, the number and severity of symptoms are different for each person. We also note there that many people with a traumatic brain injury develop a small amount of eye misalignment from the injury.
The assessment itself is a NeuroVisual Evaluation, which is our term for a detailed examination of vision that includes checking for the small amounts of misalignment a standard eye examination does not routinely identify. Where it is found, near vision, far vision and alignment are corrected using glasses with aligning lenses. We also publish a Binocular Vision Dysfunction Questionnaire on our website, so you can fill it in before you come in and we can talk through the answers at the appointment.
What we do
Our services
- Eye health examinations: complete examinations for all ages, including visual field testing, low vision assessments and testing for uncompensated heterophoria.
- Ocular disease co-management: we work alongside your other treating practitioners on cataracts, glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy and macular degeneration.
- Contact lens fitting: soft and rigid lenses, with one-on-one training for anyone wearing lenses for the first time, plus ongoing lenses and supplies.
- Specialised contact lenses: scleral rigid lenses, Ortho-K lenses for myopia control, progressive rigid gas permeable lenses, and X Chrom lenses for colour vision deficiency.
- Glasses and sunglasses: prescription glasses, prescription sunglasses, designer eyewear and eyewear packages.
- Repairs on site: we have a technician in the practice, so repairs including solders are done here rather than posted away.
- Urgent care: eye injuries, infections and contact lens problems.
The equipment we test with
A fair amount of what we can tell you depends on what we can see. We use an Ocular Coherence Tomographer for retinal assessment, an Optomap, a digital imaging slitlamp, digital fundus photography and a corneal topographer for assessing corneal shape and corneal disease. We also use an Optikam digital dispenser when fitting frames and lenses. We put the imaging on the screen and go through it with you, and we keep plain-language information pages on our website about the conditions we most often screen for, including glaucoma, macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, dry eyes, watery eyes, blepharitis and posterior vitreous detachment.
Telehealth referrals, hours and appointments
We take part in a telehealth pathway for the Great Southern, where GPs refer directly for optometry assessment covering cataracts, diabetes, glaucoma and macular degeneration, with the imaging done here in Albany. For people in the region it means fewer trips to Perth for an assessment that can be done locally. Our hours are Monday to Thursday 9:00am to 5:00pm, and Friday 9:00am to 1:00pm. We are on Albany Highway at number 3. Ring (08) 9842 2677 to make an appointment, or ask us about pricing before you book — we would rather answer that on the phone than have you guess.