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Technologies
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Lab Layout
Remote Site Processing
Surfacing Lab
Finishing Lab
Exactly how do new tracing systems improve upon the old?

Hardware - The most critical component of a successful remote site tracing location is the tracer. It must be highly accurate, easy to setup, calibrate, operate and update. In addition, it must be priced reasonably, to keep the cost of setting up a remote site location within a relatively short payback period. The savings in frame shipments to the lab, including costs associated with lost frame replacements, are part of the equation related to payback period.

All of these issues have been addressed with the 4T Tracer. It is the only tracer with vertical loading designed to simulate the placement of a frame on a face. This loading style also allows for the widest trace range in the industry, with an emphasis on the ability to trace very small eye sizes as well as extremely high-wrap frames. As equipment prices have leveled out somewhat over the last several years, it was not until the introduction of the 4T at a list price of $6,000 that remote site became economically feasible for a lot of labs.

Although the tracer is primary to the success of remote site processing, the receiving edger is just as important. An edger must be able to accurately duplicate the trace information it receives. The number of data points used has not increased since the early tracers, but the ability of edgers to produce consistent and varied finishes has improved quality and streamlined production. This has increased the overall turnaround time of each job.

Software - In the early years of remote tracing, only the trace data with a job number assigned to it could be sent to the lab. This meant that the RX still had to be phoned, mailed or faxed to the lab and the trace would be matched up with the job after the lenses were surfaced. Today there exists the ability to transmit the RX with the trace, assign a trackable invoice number at the host lab, and communicate the receipt of that job with the invoice number. Because a lab receives the RX with all the relevant information and the trace data prior to surfacing, they can make the thinnest possible plus-powered lenses. It will even choose the lens from the host lab's lens database. Add that to the ability to transmit a job day or night and the benefits are enormous.

Software used to transmit remote site data is constantly being improved in order to address a wide range of in user needs. The savings in time and convenience increases dramatically. National Optronics' Visual Lab remote software, collects and stores data in a format that is easily retrieved by other host programs. We don’t want our customers to have to invest in an expensive upgrade in order to be able to process with remote site. And to their credit, as remote site is increasing in popularity, the various industry software companies are interfacing with more equipment and satellite software packages than ever before. The most expedient thing for software and equipment vendors alike, though, is to make all of their products OMA protocol ready.
Cost - With the introduction of the 4T Tracer the cost of a single remote site location can be had for less than $8,000.
Common Questions About Remote Site Process


What past glitches in the system have been conquered?

More information is being transmitted than in the past. In the beginning a frame was scanned or outlined and then sent via modem to be duplicated. Now the three X, Y, Z axes are transmitted for a higher degree of accuracy. The Z data eliminates frame curvature as the cause of a lens being edged too small. (In the early years, tracers were two dimensional.) A, B and C dimensions are conveyed, along with DBL. And as I mentioned earlier, the receiving edger must be able to use all of that information, as our 7E edger does, in order to truly duplicate the size, shape and bevel placement desired.

How can remote tracing help labs and retailers gain and obtain business? Can remote tracing increase output and if so, by how much (on average)?

Remote site will enable labs to provide faster, more accurate service to their customers. With all of a patient’s data electronically provided, for both generating and edging, a lab can respond to their customers with a finished product within the next day. One measure of increased output can be taken by comparing the amount of time it takes for a lab to receive data via modem as opposed to someone entering it manually. As the remote software is streamlined for the retail provider through pull down menus, the less data is actually typed in. On the lab end, receiving patient info via modem cuts down the amount of data entry significantly. This increased capacity realized through operating on a higher technological plane allows a lab to be more responsive and competitive. And that’s always good for business. A trickle down effect will give retailers faster and more reliable service to pass on to their customers.

What makes the future bright for remote tracing? Will remote tracing technology be the future of communications/output/fabrication? If so, why, and if not, why not? Will other, better systems come along, or will a certain segment of the industry resist this technology? How long do you think it will take for remote tracing to take hold in any significant way?

The three dimensional trace, along with the accuracy of the edgers, increases labs' confidence that this system can improve the bottom line. Cost has been one of the most prohibitive factors of remote tracing and with the affordability of the 4T that obstacle has been removed. As the World moves toward total e-commerce it is hard to imagine that any industry, especially one tied to the medical profession, could not or indeed would not want to keep pace with the times. The equipment segment of the Optical Industry, at least as far as National Optronics’ is concerned, is one of constant evolution in design. It is rare for all segments of any industry to move at the same pace toward the same goal, and there will always be those members of the optical community who will be ahead of the curve for incorporating the very latest technology into their process. Just as there will always be those individuals who consider making glasses more art than science. I think there is room for both.

Given the response to our Tracer at the recent OLA there is no doubt in my mind that remote site tracing has already significantly taken hold. Now it’s just a matter of predicting its growth. We in manufacturing hold the key to the exponential growth in this arena by providing the industry with cost effective, efficient and accurate systems.