Keplr Vision Continues Growth With Addition of 40 New Eyecare Partnerships in 2020

BLOOMINGTON, Ill.—Amid a challenging year for many businesses and health care providers in 2020, Keplr Vision said it finished the year with an impressive 40 new eyecare partnerships. With 65 practice locations added via those partnerships, the Keplr organization “now boasts 185 total clinical locations,” the group said in an announcement late last week. Keplr Vision said it primarily focused its expansion in the Midwest while taking stronger steps into Texas and the Pacific Northwest regions in 2020.

As Vaccines Roll Out, ECPs Get in Line

NEW YORK—Across the country, COVID-19 vaccine rollout has kicked off. Most states are still in the early phases of vaccination, which usually includes older, more vulnerable members of the population, and certain frontline and health care workers. In many states, those health care workers include ECPs. For many, receiving a COVID-19 vaccine is a cause for hope, joy and celebration. To honor the science that got us here, many in the optical community have taken to social media to share the news of their vaccinations—and to share what The Cut is calling “The Vaxxie,” or the Vaccination Selfie. Here we take a look at The Vaxxie in the optical community.

James Reid Named CEO of Versant Health, a MetLife Company, as Kirk Rothrock Announces Retirement

Versant Health names new CEO, Aflac adds vision and dental insurance, optical sales continue resurgence, EyeSouth Partners expands network and EyeCare Partners adds Texas practices all topped this week’s VMAIL news feed. Click on the headlines below to catch up on anything you might have missed.

Optical Sales Across the U.S. Continued a Resurgence for Week of Jan. 4-10, Jobson Practice Performance Tracker Says

NEW YORK—U.S. optical sales continued their nationwide resurgence last week (Jan. 4-10) following the New Year and Christmas holidays. All categories, except exams/refractions, surged to numbers well above even pre-Thanksgiving levels. In fact, all categories, except exams/refractions, returned to sales rates comparable to pre-pandemic levels, and were even higher in the case of contact lenses, according to the latest Jobson Practice Performance Tracker.

EyeSouth Partners Expands Network to Include 28 Doctors in Ohio and Kentucky Through Affiliation with Midwest Eye Center

ATLANTA—EyeSouth Partners announced Monday that is has completed an affiliation with Midwest Eye Center (MWEC). The terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The affiliation represents Atlanta-based EyeSouth’s first in the states of Ohio and Kentucky. EyeSouth is an eyecare-focused management services organization backed by Shore Capital Partners, and it is committed to partnering with leading physicians to build a premier network of eyecare services in the U.S.