Hygiene measures
We have incredibly high hygiene standards and numerous measures and protocols to ensure your safety when you visit. Please feel reassured we always take all the precautions we feel necessary to safeguard our patients and staff.
Before you visit
- Please do not visit the practice if you are showing any signs of COVID-19, even if you have not been diagnosed.
- Patients are encouraged to wear face masks when they are within two metres of a member of staff, such as during an eye examination or when glasses are being fitted. If you do not have a face mask, we can provide one to you on arrival.
- Please use the hand sanitiser on entering the practice. In addition, patients are encouraged to wash their hands in the basins situated in all examination rooms.
- We are making every effort to minimise the number of people in the practice at any one time, so ask that you come to the practice alone where possible. Obviously where a child is being seen or you have a specific need for a chaperone, we appreciate this will not always be possible.
- Please do not arrive too early for your appointment.
- Patients should advise if they are considered vulnerable. A separate entrance is available for those patients who will be taken straight to their appointment in the fourth examination room, based in the basement so they do not need to enter the main body of the practice and will only see their optometrist during their visit.
In the practice
- All normal infection control procedures will be adopted throughout the practice. This will include infection control measures throughout the examination – hand hygiene and decontamination of all reusable surfaces and apparatus.
- All re-usable apparatus will be disinfected after use.
- Single use disposable apparatus will be used whenever possible.
- Every effort has been made to ensure that social distancing is possible throughout the practice, spacing out the waiting area and limiting numbers of people (staff and patients) in the practice.
- All rooms will be adequately ventilated.
- Appointments will be spread out to allow enough time for thorough cleaning of clinical areas and more frequent cleaning of communal areas.
- Tissues will be available throughout the practice to allow patients to cover their nose and mouth should they need to cough or sneeze. Pedal bins are available for safe disposal of tissues.
Dispensing
- All frames will be disinfected after handling before returning them to the display stock.
- Frames will be adjusted to fit at dispensing to minimise contact time at collection.
- Frames can be posted out, or collected from outside the practice if the patient prefers.
- All collections will be by appointment only to control numbers within the premises.
- Payments will be taken by contactless payment where possible. As some patients will need to use the keypad, the card machine will be cleaned after handling. Cash payments will not be accepted.
Our team
- All staff undertook additional specialist infection control training in June 2020.
- Staff will go through the same daily COVID-19 health checks to ensure they are symptom free and do not attend the practice should they have any symptoms associated with COVID-19.
- In addition, many other internal measures and protocols are in place regarding practices employed in the practice.
We have prepared this video for you to view prior to visiting the practice so you can see what to expect – this has changed slightly as restrictions have eased.
We hope you find this reassuring. If you would like to discuss anything prior to, or after your visit, please get in touch.