Posts

At The Ohio State University College of Optometry, we promise to deliver exceptional care, which includes providing a safe and healthy environment for our patients, visitors, and staff. In response to COVID-19, all entrants to our facility will be screened to help prevent our faculty, staff, students, and patients from being exposed to this virus. We will check everyone’s temperature, ask health screening questions, and adhere to social distancing standards to support a safe and healthy environment.

The 352 W 10^th Ave (Fry Tower) entrance is designated for optometry faculty, staff, students, and research participants. The door will remain locked, but allow faculty, staff, and students to enter via card swipe during specified business hours. Entrants should line up respecting 6ft of social distancing outside the 352 entrance. The screening process will occur within the vestibule.

• Faculty, staff, and students will use their BuckID to open the door themselves. They must present their BuckID to initiate the screening process.
• A list of appointed research participants will be kept at the screening desk. Research participants that present to Fry 352 will need to be let into the vestibule by the screener to begin the screening process.
• If any clinic patients present to the Fry 352 entrance, they should be directed to the 338 W 10^th Ave (Fry Bridge) entrance.
• No visitors are allowed into the building except for the following situations:
  1. (1) adult/guardian to accompany a minor research participant
  2. (1) adult/caregiver to accompany a faculty, staff, student, or research participant if physical or cognitive handicap assistance is needed to move patient through facility

SCREENER RESPONSIBILITIES (PRESCREENING):

1. On the day of your screening, ensure that you answer “NO” to all the screening questions and check your temperature at home prior to traveling to campus. If your temperature measures 100.0° F or higher, please call Carol Wilcox at (614) 284-8651 to inform her of your inability to complete your screening shift.
2. Otherwise, arrive a few minutes before your screening start time. Enter the building at the Fry 352 entrance via card swipe entry.
3. Date and wear your screening sticker where it is easily visible by all.
4. Properly don a college-provided N95 mask (or level 1 surgical mask if an N95 is not available). Homemade masks or facial coverings are prohibited while screening.
5. Ensure you have the proper supplies at the screening table including a non-contact thermometer, spare batteries, screening stickers, a Sharpie, level 1 surgical masks, paper bags, gloves, hand sanitizer, disinfection wipes, screening guidelines, and your cell phone.
6. Screeners are allowed to have a book, laptop, tablet, etc. to conduct work in between screening duties.

SCREENING TESTS/QUESTIONS: Answers of “NO” to all questions will result in allowed entry to the facility

• “We need to check your temperature.”
  100. If the temperature is 100.0° F or higher, they will not be allowed entry and should be instructed to contact their primary care provider or call 614-293-4000 to determine if testing is needed.

• ““Have you had new onset of fever, chills, loss of taste/smell, or any flulike symptoms in the past 5 days?”
  1. If YES, they will not be allowed entry and should be instructed to contact their primary care provider or call 614-293-4000 to determine if testing is needed.

SCREENER RESPONSIBILITIES (POSTSCREENING):

1. Provide all entrants successfully screened a screening sticker with today’s date written with a Sharpie. Instruct them to wear the sticker where it is easily visible throughout their stay in the facility.
2. Provide all first time entrants successfully screened a level 1 surgical mask. Faculty, staff, and students should also be provided a paper bag to store their mask.
   1. Faculty, staff, and students will be encouraged to preserve their level 1 masks for multiple days of wear. On future entries to the building, they should be provided an additional mask when one is requested.
3. All entrants to the building must have a properly worn facial covering prior to entering the building from the vestibule.
   1. Faculty, staff, and students may enter the facility with a homemade mask/facial covering, an N95, or a level 1 surgical mask.
   2. Unless they already present wearing an N95 mask, research participants and approved visitors should don their level 1 masks while in the vestibule prior to entering the building. They may wear their level 1 mask on top of or in place of their own facial covering.
4. Re-entrants to the building that have been successfully screened that day will be allowed to enter without having to be rescreened provided they are wearing the appropriate face mask described above.

View the PDF Optometry Services COVID-19 Checklist for High-Risk Workers Returning Home.

Download Cool Brutus coloring page

University Marketing has developed several options to help the university community feel like they’re back on campus already. The download page also provides instructions for how to set your background.

https://www.osu.edu/downloads/zoom-backgrounds.html

This message from Dean Karla Zadnik, OD, PhD, was emailed to the Class of 2020 on Monday, April 6, 2020. 

Dear Class of 2020—

Thank you so much for your flexibility and commitment to the completion of your Doctor of Optometry degree this semester. I know this is not what any of us had in mind, but, as Queen Elizabeth put it over the weekend, “I hope in the years to come everyone will be able to take pride in how they responded to this challenge.” I know that you will be able to take personal pride in your tenacity and dedication to your education and your future as an optometrist.

As you know, your attendings have been hard at work to ensure that you engage in critical thinking exercises to mirror what you would have learned in the remainder of your clinical rotations. I understand your participation in those exercises has been engaged and enthusiastic. Thank you for that. We will describe those activities in our annual report to the Accreditation Council on Optometric Education, due on May 1, and anticipate their acceptance of our teaching and your learning effors.

Here is the latest information from the university registrar. May 3, 2020 will still be your official degree conferral date. Once the university processes grades and goes through the normal end-of-term academic check-out, your transcripts and official, university- and college-level student records will show that you received your OD degree (and MS degree for those of you in the combined OD/MS program) graduated as of May 3, 2020. That means you can put OD or OD, MS after your name beginning May 3, 2020. The registrar is not sure what will happen with diplomas exactly, but assume that as soon as the diplomas are ready, the university will offer diploma delivery options, e.g., mailing and, eventually, in-person pickup perhaps.

As always, let me know if you have any questions I can answer. Stay safe.

–KZ

Karla Zadnik, OD PhD

Dean and Glenn A. Fry Professor in Optometry and Physiological Optics

The Ohio State University College of Optometry