Hollie McDonald and Lahiru Gunasena

Zeiss Medical New Zealand has appointed two new product specialists to replace Chris Money: former nurse Hollie McDonald, who’s looking after the company’s intraocular lens (IOL) portfolio; and former Auckland Eye ophthalmic technician, Lahiru Gunasena, who’s responsible for devices.

Fresh from their Australian training, and just four weeks into the job, both were brimming with enthusiasm for Zeiss, their new roles and their debut at the RANZCO NZ conference.

Sri Lankan-born and UK-trained Gunasena was brought up with eyes as his parents own an optometry practice in Sri Lanka. Being an ophthalmic technician gives him a good understanding of devices, “so, I know what the clients are talking about,” he said.

McDonald said her first love was also eyes, having started work at Eye Surgery Associates in Melbourne as a medical secretary and then becoming a field test technician at Eye Institute in Auckland. “I decided to do my nursing training with the intent to go straight back into eyes, but then I was side-tracked into the trauma business for quite a number of years. So, it’s nice to be back.”

Clarus 700

New to Zeiss’ stand at this year’s conference was the Clarus 700, a comprehensive ultra-widefield retinal camera with the true colour of its predecessor, the Clarus 500, but now with fluorescein angiography. So, you can see more and diagnose disease earlier, said Gunasena.

HFA3 with Sita Faster 24-2C

Another upgrade on display was the new Sita Faster 24-2C testing strategy for the Humphrey Field Analyzer 3 (HFA3) perimeter. The latest test adds 10 points to the central field, selected to cover areas known to be susceptible to glaucomatous defects, said Gunasena. “It saves time because you don’t have to do two tests separately… and the patients are happy because it’s faster.”

AT Lara EDoF IOLs

AT Lara 829MP and AT Lara toric 929M/MP are the next generation of extended depth of focus (EDoF) IOLs, providing an even wider range of focus as well as excellent optical performance and vision quality, said McDonald. “They are designed to provide a high degree of spectacle independence and to induce less visual side effects compared to multifocal IOLs… They are particularly attractive to patients with an active lifestyle who wish to be spectacle-free but are sensitive to side effects such as halos and glare.”

Visthesia

Also new to the market is Visthesia, the first and only ophthalmic viscosurgical device (OVD) combining an ophthalmic viscoelastic and an ancillary anaesthetic to provide more comfort to the patient, especially during prolonged procedures, said McDonald. “Given New Zealand’s largest private health provider, Southern Cross, has stopped funding anaesthetists (see pX), this is a fantastic product. It’s just not many people know about it yet.”