Virginia Eye Consultants
Upon entering college, I already
had the goal of becoming an optometrist someday. I picked optometry because of
my experiences with my own poor vision, which began in third grade when I was
sent to the eye doctor because I couldn’t read the chalkboard from far away.
When I was deciding what kind of career path I wanted to follow in college, I
thought back to all the times my eye doctor explained the science behind my
eyesight and how fascinating it was to me. Upon arriving at UVA, I didn’t think
there would be many others who had this career goal, but I was pleased and
surprised to find a Pre-Optometry Club table at the Fall Club Fair during my
first semester. I quickly became involved with the Pre-Optometry Club in order learn
from other students who were older than me and to find ways to get involved in
order to enhance my application. The Pre-Optometry Club regularly hosts
recruiters from different optometry schools who make presentations about what
they are looking for in an applicant. From these presentations I’ve learned
that a big part of what medical and health schools look for is experience and
knowledge of the field, and today in this blog post I am going to talk about a
summer work experience that contributed to both of these areas.
After my second year, I knew that
summer I had to work to make money, but I didn’t think I could find a job that
was health-related and one that I actually enjoyed. It was through a friend
that I first heard about Virginia Eye Consultants—she had worked there the
previous summer. I reached out to human resources inquiring about available
positions, and after sending my resume and doing a phone interview, I was hired
in the position of Client Support Specialist for the summer. When applying for
a position like this, the process could vary depending on the company, but a
good start is to contact someone human resources and see what they are looking
for. If a friend puts in a good word for you, the process usually goes very
smoothly. A lot of times it’s less stressful and intense than you think!
Virginia Eye Consultants is a large
ophthalmology practice that sees and treats patients for all kinds of eye
related issues, including surgery for glaucoma, cataracts, eye trauma, and
LASIK vision correction. My position was on the clinical side where patients
were seen before and after surgery and for check-ups. It was a large clinic and
I guided the patients through each step of the process, set-up the rooms for
the doctors, and even got to assist the doctors sometimes during their
examinations. I learned so much about the health field that I didn’t know
before because I was right there in the middle of all of the patient-doctor
interactions. On a daily-basis, my roles really varied depending on who needed
help that day. Sometimes my whole day would be accompanying patients to the
different stages of their appointment, and other times it would be rotating
between the different rooms and getting whatever the doctors needed during
their examinations, like making phone calls to other clinics or running
upstairs to the surgery clinic to check schedule availability if a patient
needed an emergency surgery. Towards the end of my summer there, I even got to
be trained on how to take different images of the eyes and was able to take
pictures for doctors all on my own. The diversity of my role was a huge reason
why I enjoyed this job so much—every day had different tasks and different
patients and physicians to interact with.
I also learned how it takes the
cooperation of many employees in different roles working together to give a
patient the best experience. Not only was it a great learning experience, but
also an invaluable networking opportunity. Through working there, I met over
ten ophthalmologists and optometrists that I know I could contact if I ever
wanted to shadow them. This was such a great experience and it just goes to
show that there are so many opportunities out there, you just have to find
them! UVA students with the same career interests are great resources for
finding out about jobs, shadowing, or other ways to get involved in the field,
so I definitely recommend finding a club that has students you can talk to about
their experiences and get ideas for your own path. The Career Center also puts
on a lot of programs with representatives from different companies that are
really relaxed and fun, so I would check those out too to find out about
different employment opportunities. The summer is a great time to use
internships, jobs, or shadowing to enhance your application because schools
will see how dedicated you are outside of the classroom.
Kalie Leone is a 4th
year pre-optometry student in the College majoring in Biology. She is the
President for the Pre-Optometry Club and has been a member of the Pre-Health
Student Leadership Advisory Board for the last two years.
