• By now MIDO will be drawing to a close, with the usual cut-throat negotiations over agencies nearing completion.
It’s an annual event that brings out the best (or worst, depending on the outcomes for parties involved) in negotiations as deals are thrashed out for the coming year(s). There’s always some blood on the floor at the end of it all, but the spoils care usually worth it. And of course there’s always the fall-back ‘valuable-contacts-were-made’ to justify the costs.
It’s an expensive business to go to MIDO from here, but offsetting that is it brings the opportunity to go to Italy. Worth the costs on its own!

• I hear a strong rumour that a certain group of practices is up for sale.
Nothing more to add at this stage, although if it’s true then the ownership will have been one of the shortest ever.

• One of the early signatories on a petition by an online optical retailer in the United Kingdom seeking mandatory inclusion of PDs in prescriptions commented: “Good luck with the campaign. What on earth is the point of a prescription that does not contain all the necessary information? Glasses-wearers are being ripped off.” A good point perhaps, although there is argument to the contrary. Perhaps the new Optometry Board of Australia could put its collective mind to the matter, rather than spending time making registered optometrists gain half the 40 CPD points they need for continuing registration via face-to-face tuition.

• A large bronze statue of a former governor of New South Wales, Lachlan Macquarie, has been banished to a storeroom after occupying a prominent position in the Sydney street of the same name – the haunt of medical specialists, including many ophthalmologists.
Nicknamed ‘the Flasher’ because of what some say he seems to be up to under his coat, it’s been suggested that with some suitable plumbing the statue could be turned into an adult version of thr Mannekin Pis of Brussels.
Great idea, particularly if the Guv is positioned to face the NSW Parliament and its politician inmates!

• As the 1-July date for national accreditation and registration of health-care professionals draws closer, the new National Psychology Board of Australia has decided not to provide information about the qualifications of psychologists, thereby flouting the objectives of the legislation that establishes the national boards.
But a far more serious potential problem is surely that of so-called ‘counsellors’, whose training and qualifications are all over the shop. One such ‘counsellor’ of yours truly’s acquaintance of long ago was a psychiatrist before being struck off for having an affair with a teenage patient.

Said ex-medico now trades as a ‘counsellor’, seemingly without any problem with registration authorities. So much for providing the community with protection against charlatans, national registration or not.

• Happy Australia Day to you if you’re at work instead of taking a break after the rigours of the Silly Season.
It won’t be long to wait for Easter and another break. And it will mean the beginning of the best season of the year – Autumn!

• How long will it be before the federal government makes up its mind to be reasonable about the Medicare benefit it will pay for cataract surgery.
It’s about nine months since the proposed 50-per-cent cut was announced in the 2009-10 budget and the government knows it has to back down – at least a good part of the way, or, better, completely. Let’s see some action; end the uncertainty, minister, or is it all too hard for you?

• If you’re having trouble coming to terms with what the federal health minister and her department (particularly the latter) is up to in regard to Medicare benefits for cataract surgery, you might find it illuminating to look no further than the book ‘Dark Victory’ by David Marr and Marian Wilkinson and its coverage of the ‘children overboard’ affair in 2001, including the role of a now very senior health department official.

• Was it really Specsavers’ co-founder Doug Perkins seen queuing up recently to buy his membership card at the first Costco megastore in Melbourne’s Docklands, which happens to include an optical department?

• And I hear that the queues at Costco are longer than a tightwad’s pockets are deep, with the people in one on a recent Thursday afternoon taking 40 minutes to reach the counter where five staff were busily issuing membership cards at $50 each.

•In an interview with London’s Guardian newspaper, Specsavers co-founder Dame Mary Perkins mentioned that on occasions she poses as a mystery shopper in the company’s outlets to check customer service standards are maintained.
She does it herself, rather than engage a specialist mystery-shopper organization to do the legwork.
Your humble scribe’s guess is that by doing it herself, Dame Mary gets a much faster and better feel for what is going on, rather than paying a motza for someone to go forth and (no, not multiply) see what’s happening, then prepare a report, and so on. How come? Because by the time ‘outsiders’ are briefed, actually go look see, write up their experiences, and then present them, it’s most likely all has changed.
A matter of a straw poll beating a broader one hands down because of knowing what to look for in such a complex business as retail optics.