Fitting GP lenses can be an extremely rewarding endeavor for practitioners and patients. However, as a practitioner’s GP lens-wearing patient base grows, incidents will arise that will test both the customer service values of any office and the patience of any GP lens wearer. It is crucial to plan in advance for such occurrences and to have solutions ready to offer as they arise.

Lost Lenses

Unfortunately, patients will occasionally lose or break their GP lenses. This is particularly true of patients who are new to contact lenses or new to this modality. If it happens early in the fitting process, lens dislocation due to a poor fit may be to blame, though it is more often due to patient difficulties with application and removal. While it is tempting (and usually valid) to pass the resulting replacement costs on to the patients, it may be necessary for the practice to absorb this cost if a patient is upset. Establishing an office policy with regard to lost lenses can help prevent unnecessary confusion.

Broken Lenses

Some GP lens materials come with breakage warranties, but lens replacement is allowed only if the broken pieces are returned as proof. It is helpful when choosing a GP lens manufacturer to ask which materials offer this benefit. Patients generally do not think to save broken lens fragments, so it is important to explain this caveat to them before dispensing lenses when such a warranty policy is available.

Rarely, a staff member or practitioner may break a patient’s lens while attempting to verify, clean, or polish the lens. If the lens is outside of any warranty period and the patient doesn’t have a replacement lens to wear while waiting for an order, this can be a very difficult situation to handle. Encourage patients to replace their lenses on a regular basis (generally every one-to-two years for any GP lens) and to keep a usable backup pair handy to help prevent excessive inconvenience in this scenario. Using a lab with a quick turnaround manufacturing time and overnight shipping will help alleviate patient frustration in these situations.

Lens and Corneal Warpage

Difficulties can arise when attempting to refit or match a patient’s GP lenses if their habitual pair is older and/or warped. Resulting corneal warpage may prevent a newly ordered lens from fitting as comfortably as the previous pair.

Warpage can be verified in the lens via radiuscope (Figure 1) or on corneal topography. Patients may assume that the lens was fit or ordered incorrectly unless they are warned of this possibility beforehand. Again, encouraging annual or biannual replacement of corneal GPs helps avoid this problem.

Get Policies in Place

Exceptions to policies are often made in the name of good customer service. That said, having policies in place not only prevents confusion as to how to proceed when these scenarios arise, it also warns patients that exceptions are not to be expected on a regular basis. Additionally, encouraging patients to replace their GPs regularly and to keep a decent backup pair can help prevent many surprisingly common and potentially frustrating and/or costly situations. CLS