BCLA relaunches national contact lens campaign

BCLA relaunches national contact lens campaign

The BCLA is bringing back the national ¡®Love Your Lenses¡¯ campaign, with eye care professionals urged to sign up to spread awareness of the benefits of lenses.

The campaign, previously run by the General Optical Council, has been taken over and revitalised by BCLA after lying dormant last year partly due to the pandemic.

Taking place from Monday, 14 June, to Sunday, 20 June, the focus of this year¡¯s Love Your Lenses campaign will be on safety and compliance, urging practitioners to suggest to patients that it¡¯s ¡®time to try¡¯ contact lenses ¨C reinforcing the message that lenses are safe to wear, highlighting them to new wearers and bringing back former wearers.

There will also be a secondary message this year ¨C looking at how wearing contact lenses rather than spectacles can stop the problem of glasses steaming up in the age of facemasks.

Luke Stevens-Burt, Chief Executive of the BCLA, said: ¡°Love Your Lenses Week is about loving your lenses so that you love your eyes, with safe practice comes safe wear. Contact lenses can change lives for the better. We are passionate about the role they play in eye health.

¡°The BCLA is proud to bring back Love Your Lenses week and we are now inviting practices to sign up and support a campaign that raises awareness of safe contact lens wear and the benefits of wearing contact lenses.

¡°There has never been a better time to make the switch from spectacles to contact lenses. We believe this campaign can act as a catalyst for change ¨C driving people towards contact lenses and a new lifestyle filled with freedom, choice and comfort.¡±

The campaign will be officially launched at the most anticipated contact lens virtual event of the 2021 optometry calendar, the BCLA Clinical Conference and Exhibition, which will take place Saturday, June 13, to Sunday, June 14.

Luke added: ¡°With mask-wearing becoming an essential part of our daily routine during the COVID-19 pandemic, anyone wearing glasses will have experienced the all-too-regular frustration of ¡®steaming¡¯ or ¡®fogging¡¯ whenever they step inside a shop. Contact lenses can eradicate that problem immediately.¡±

Registration to the campaign is free to eye care professionals. Participants will receive a printed resource pack, including t-shirts, posters, pens and stickers. An online resource pack, containing digital animations, social media graphics, factsheets and a checklist, will also be shared to provide participants with everything they need to stage their local campaign.

Love Your Lenses is a UK campaign but practices outside of the UK are welcome to spread the message in their countries and/or regions. BCLA cannot provide printed materials internationally, but practices can use the digital resources.