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Variation in eye care professional distribution across Europe, a survey

Eye (2024)Cite this article

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Eye care professionals across Europe encompass a range of professionals who screen, diagnose and treat ocular diseases. Their qualifications and roles might differ notably based on national regulations, healthcare system and number of ophthalmologists per inhabitants. There is little objective data presenting how the spectrum of eye care professionals differs between countries in Europe, and how their roles may vary as a result of this. Given the European Union principle of freedom of movement of professionals, it is key to understand how roles differ between countries. Furthermore, future efforts to standardise training and benchmark eye care delivery models need to take into account variations in eye care professional make-up and roles. To investigate the similarities and differences across Europe, we conducted a survey among national representatives of the European Union of Medical Specialists (UEMS) Ophthalmology section. UEMS delegates were questioned regarding ophthalmologists, ophthalmic medical practitioners (general practitioner with an ophthalmology qualification), optometrists, orthoptists, commercial opticians and ophthalmic nurses’ practice patterns in their own country. The following parameters were evaluated: number, regulation, level of education, ability and scope of practice. An electronic survey was conducted between March and May 2023. We collected results from 26 UEMS representatives out of 31 countries. Table 1.

Table 1 Eye care professional across Europe.
Full size table

Across Europe, the mean number of ophthalmologists per 100,000 inhabitants was 9.36 ± 3.79. The number of active ophthalmologists was regulated by the government in 50% of cases. Medical and surgical ophthalmologists were different entities in 26.9% of the countries, with 4 to 6 years to become medical consultant and with another 5 to 10 supplementary years to become a surgical consultant in a separate residency program.

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Acknowledgements

We want to thank Lisa Flanagan for her support in the SOE Leadership Development Programme.

Funding

APK is supported by a UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowship, an Alcon Research Institute Young Investigator Award and a Lister Institute for Preventive Medicine Award. This research was supported by the NIHR Biomedical Research Centre at Moorfields Eye Hospital and the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ophthalmology, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France

    Louis Arnould

  2. Department of Ophthalmology, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary

    Balazs Varsanyi

  3. Department of Ophthalmology, Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, Dublin, Ireland

    Edward Dervan

  4. Department of Ophthalmology, Department of Surgical, Medical, Molecular Pathology and Critical Care Medicine, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy

    Chiara Posarelli

  5. West Lisbon Hospitals Center, Hospital of Egas Moniz (CHLO), Lisbon, Portugal

    Helena Prior Filipe

  6. Egas Moniz Center of Interdisciplinary Research (CiiEM), Lisbon, Portugal

    Helena Prior Filipe

  7. Department of Ophthalmology, Strasbourg University Hospital, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France

    Tristan Bourcier

  8. Gepromed Education Department, Strasbourg, France

    Tristan Bourcier

  9. Department of Ophthalmology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

    Andreas Wedrich

  10. Department of Ophthalmology, Zagreb, Croatia

    Renata Ivekovic

  11. Center for Eye Research and Innovative Diagnostics, Department of Ophthalmology, Institute for Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo, and Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway

    Goran Petrovski

  12. Department of Ophthalmology, University of Split School of Medicine and University Hospital Centre, Split, Croatia

    Goran Petrovski

  13. Department of Ophthalmology, Utrecht University Hospital, Utrecht and Amphia Hospital, Breda, The Netherlands

    Giorgio L. Porro

  14. Department of Ophthalmology, Riga Stradins University, Riga, Latvia

    Guna Laganovska

  15. Department of Ophthalmlogy, P. Stradins Clinical University Hospital, Riga, Latvia

    Guna Laganovska

  16. Department of Ophthalmology, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Kaunas, Lithuania

    Vilma Jurate Balciuniene

  17. Department of Ophthalmolgy, Silesian University of Medicine, Katowice, Poland

    Ewa Mrukwa-Kominek

  18. Eye clinic Bonner Augen, Bonn, Germany

    Karsten Paust

  19. Clinique Swiss Visio Montchoisi, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Segolene Roemer

  20. Department of Ophthalmology, Basel, Switzerland

    Ivan O. Haefliger

  21. Department of Ophthalmology, Ankara Uinversity Hospital, Ankara, Turkey

    Huban Atilla

  22. Department of Ophthalmology, Ashtead Hospital, Surrey, UK

    Paul Ursell

  23. Deparment of Ophthalmology, Eye Hospital Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Barba Cvenkel

  24. Department of Cinical Medecine, Glostrup, Denmark

    Jens Kiilgaard

  25. Specialized Eye Hospital, Varna, Bulgaria

    Christina Grupcheva

  26. Department of Ophthalmology, Comenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia

    Alena Furdova

  27. Department of Ophthalmology, Kortrijk, Belgium

    Marnix Claeys

  28. Department of Ophthalmology, Palacky University Olomouc, Olomouc, Czech Republic

    Klara Maresova

  29. Department of Ophthalmology, Mater Dei Hospital, Msida, Malta

    Franco Mercieca

  30. Eye Clinic, East Tallinn, Tallinn, Estonia

    Toomas Sepp

  31. University of Athens, Athens, Greece

    Efstratios Parikakis

  32. Carol Davila University of Medecine, Bucharest, Romania

    Marian Burcea

  33. King’s College Hospital, London, UK

    Wagih Aclimandos

  34. NIHR Biomedical Research Centre, Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust & UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, London, UK

    Anthony P. Khawaja

Authors
  1. Louis Arnould
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  2. Balazs Varsanyi
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  3. Edward Dervan
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  4. Chiara Posarelli
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  5. Helena Prior Filipe
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  6. Tristan Bourcier
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  7. Andreas Wedrich
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  8. Renata Ivekovic
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  11. Guna Laganovska
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  12. Vilma Jurate Balciuniene
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  13. Ewa Mrukwa-Kominek
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  14. Karsten Paust
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  15. Segolene Roemer
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  16. Ivan O. Haefliger
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  17. Huban Atilla
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  18. Paul Ursell
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  19. Barba Cvenkel
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  20. Jens Kiilgaard
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  21. Christina Grupcheva
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  22. Alena Furdova
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  23. Marnix Claeys
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  24. Klara Maresova
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  25. Franco Mercieca
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  26. Toomas Sepp
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  27. Efstratios Parikakis
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  28. Marian Burcea
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  29. Wagih Aclimandos
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  30. Anthony P. Khawaja
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Contributions

LA, BV, ED were responsible for writing the manuscript and analysing data. CP, HPF, TB, AW, RI, GP, GLP, GL, VJB, EMK, KP, SR, IOH, HA, PU, BC, JK, CG, AF, MC, KM, FM, TS, EP, MB completed the survey and edited the manuscript. WA, APK were supervising the research project.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Louis Arnould.

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Competing interests

APK has acted as a paid consultant or lecturer to Abbvie, Aerie, Allergan, Google Health, Heidelberg Engineering, Novartis, Reichert, Santen, Thea and Topcon.

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Arnould, L., Varsanyi, B., Dervan, E. et al. Variation in eye care professional distribution across Europe, a survey. Eye (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41433-024-03010-7

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