Optometry in the context of "Healthcare"

Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in people. Health care is delivered by health professionals and allied health fields. Medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, midwifery, nursing, optometry, audiology, psychology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, athletic training, and other health professions all constitute health care. The term includes work done in providing primary care, secondary care, tertiary care, and public health.

Access to health care may vary across countries, communities, and individuals, influenced by social and economic conditions and health policies. Providing health care services means "the timely use of personal health services to achieve the best possible health outcomes". Factors to consider in terms of health care access include financial limitations (such as insurance coverage), geographical and logistical barriers (such as additional transportation costs and the ability to take paid time off work to use such services), sociocultural expectations, and personal limitations (lack of ability to communicate with health care providers, poor health literacy, low income). Limitations to health care services affect negatively the use of medical services, the efficacy of treatments, and overall outcome (well-being, mortality rates).

Interferometry is a technique which uses the interference of superimposed waves to extract information. Interferometry typically uses electromagnetic waves and is an important investigative technique in the fields of astronomy, fiber optics, engineering metrology, optical metrology, oceanography, seismology, spectroscopy (and its applications to chemistry), quantum mechanics, nuclear and particle physics, plasma physics, biomolecular interactions, surface profiling, microfluidics, mechanical stress/strain measurement, velocimetry, optometry, and making holograms.

Interferometers are devices that extract information from interference. They are widely used in science and industry for the measurement of microscopic displacements, refractive index changes and surface irregularities. In the case with most interferometers, light from a single source is split into two beams that travel in different optical paths, which are then combined again to produce interference; two incoherent sources can also be made to interfere under some circumstances. The resulting interference fringes give information about the difference in optical path lengths. In analytical science, interferometers are used to measure lengths and the shape of optical components with nanometer precision; they are the highest-precision length measuring instruments in existence. In Fourier transform spectroscopy they are used to analyze light containing features of absorption or emission associated with a substance or mixture. An astronomical interferometer consists of two or more separate telescopes that combine their signals, offering a resolution equivalent to that of a telescope of diameter equal to the largest separation between its individual elements.

Vision science is the scientific study of visual perception. Researchers in vision science can be called vision scientists, especially if their research spans some of the science's many disciplines.

Vision science encompasses all studies of vision, such as how human and non-human organisms process visual information, how conscious visual perception works in humans, how to exploit visual perception for effective communication, and how artificial systems can do the same tasks. Vision science overlaps with or encompasses disciplines such as ophthalmology and optometry, neuroscience(s), psychology (particularly sensation and perception psychology, cognitive psychology, linguistics, biopsychology, psychophysics, and neuropsychology), physics (particularly optics), ethology, and computer science (particularly computer vision, artificial intelligence, and computer graphics), as well as other engineering related areas such as data visualization, user interface design, and human factors and ergonomics. Below is a list of pertinent journals and international conferences.

Carl Zeiss Meditec AG is a multinational medical technology company and subsidiary of Carl Zeiss AG. It manufactures tools for eye examinations and medical lasers as well as solutions for neurosurgery, dentistry, gynecology and oncology. Among its products are the most common tools used by ophthalmologists and optometrists.

In October 2018, Carl Zeiss Meditec won FDA premarket approval for its ReLEx Smile laser system.

The School of Optometry and Vision Science is a professional school at the University of Waterloo within the Faculty of Science. It is the only English-language optometry program in Canada; the French language Université de Montréal optometry program operates in Quebec. The school offers an accredited undergraduate Doctor of Optometry program and a Vision Science graduate degree program. It also operates two optometry clinics open to the public.