Thematic review
We are carrying out a thematic review on commercial practices and patient safety.
The commercial nature of eye care services is an inherent feature of the sector. When it operates well, this brings several benefits for patients including by spurring innovation that widens access to services and improves the quality of care. However, our research and wider engagement have highlighted that commercial practices can pose a risk to patients and potentially put undue pressure on registrants.
Our aim in carrying out this thematic review is to help us understand the nature and extent of these practices and their impacts, and to identify any interventions that we and the wider sector can take to help mitigate against these. The review will be looking at the following areas, but will also consider other areas of concern if they emerge:
- Overbooking/ghost clinics (these take different forms, but are typically where a business double books patients in a clinic, to mitigate against lost appointments due to patients that don’t attend, which may result in rushed or reduced appointment times).
- Short sight testing times.
- Commercial targets and incentives (such as selling products and services that are more financially beneficial to the business or that the patient may not clinically require).
- Lack of transparency around costs and eligibility for NHS financial support.
- Refusal to treat young children, in part for commercial reasons.
We will be engaging with stakeholders, including registrants, businesses, optical sector organisations and patient representative bodies, as part of this review so that we can fully understand different perspectives within the sector. We will produce a published report at the end of the review which we will aim to present to GOC Council in June 2026.
For more information, please refer to the project document below or contact the GOC policy team at [email protected].