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Health care professionals who make and dispense spectacles and other corrective vision equipment are known as opticians rather than optometrists or ophthalmologists. These latter actually perform medical tests or have medical training. An optician focuses primarily on the equipment and teaching eye patients how to wear and care for their eye glasses.

The tasks performed by opticians have only existed since the middle ages. Prior to this period, spectacles, or eyeglasses, were unknown to the human race. People with poor vision simply suffered or went blind. The idea of using glass, or water, to improve vision for the purposes of reading was known to the ancients but no one seems to have created functioning eyeglasses until around 1,000 years ago. Paintings done by monks in the 14th century clearly show men in scriptoriums wearing spectacles as they copy texts. It is not known just how useful these devices were.

It was not until the 16th century that someone invented concave lenses to help with myopia. This was truly the task of opticians. You could not simply make spectacles from random pieces of glass. They realized that the glass had to be ground and shaped a certain way in order to have a truly beneficial effect on vision.

The next great advance in the manufacture of lenses was a device to keep them attached to one’s nose. Prior to this, wearers of spectacles were forced to hold the lenses against their eyes to keep them in place. The initial improvement of this problem required the use of a strap that held the lenses in place. In the 18th century, opticians finally determined how to hold the spectacles in place with rigid pieces of metal attached to the sides of the lenses which ran over the ears.

By the late 18th century, many people around the world were wearing eyeglasses. This allowed educated people to continue reading well into their old age and discontinued the need for people to read aloud to these individuals. Adaptations of this corrective eyewear continued throughout the 19th century. Use of the monocle began to spread around Europe during this century. The monocle was a single lens that could fit neatly between cheek bone and eyebrow.

Today, opticians work in conjunction with ophthalmologists to create eye wear that is specifically fabricated to fit the needs of specific individuals. The ophthalmologist performs the necessary tests and analyzes the medical problem that may be causing the impaired vision. Then he or she recommends the patient to an in-house optician who can select or create the right lens required to correct the problem. The optician will also instruct the patient in how to use the spectacles and care for them properly.

An optician can also work in an independent setting in which he or she makes and fits lenses for patients who have been recommended by ophthalmologists. This field continues to grow as the world population ages and experiences need for corrective eye wear. The work of opticians also includes recommending the accessories that go with eyewear.