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Improving optometry as a profession leads to a PhD

19 April 2024 | Story André Damons | Photo Charl Devenish

Dr Nashua Naicker, lecturer and Chairperson: Learning and Teaching Committee (SoHRS) in the Department of Optometry, UFS School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, graduated on Thursday (April 18) with the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Health Professions Education.

A strong need to improve the general standing of optometry as a profession and to create lifelong learning opportunities for locally trained optometrists beyond what currently exists, is what led Dr Nashua Naicker to pursue a PhD in this field.

Dr Naicker, lecturer, and Chairperson: Learning and Teaching Committee (SoHRS) in the Department of Optometry, UFS School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, says he feels an overwhelming sense of relief with a keen sense accomplishment by achieving what he set out to through persistence in the face of adversity.

He graduated on Thursday (18 April) at the Faculty of Health Sciences April graduation ceremony with the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Health Professions Education through the Division of Health Sciences Education. “I am pleased and hope to change the narrative on this new path as an accredited researcher from ‘how long are you going to take to finish?’ to ‘what have you learnt in this journey?’. We are far too focused on chasing a timeline rather than focusing on the contribution that one makes and the self-development in this journey of discovery,” says Dr Naicker.

His supervisor was Prof Alvin J Munsamy from University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) and co-supervisor Dr CB Written from the UFS.

Need for educational expansion

His research was focused on establishing a framework for postgraduate programmes in specialty fields of optometry for South Africa. The investigation was carried out with practising optometrists as the primary stakeholders and with optometric academics as the custodians for education and training in the country.

“With an overwhelming need for educational expansion found in this investigation, a conceptual framework was proposed as the innovation to take the profession forward in South Africa. Improving patient care from being upskilled and receiving professional recognition for the additional competencies and proficiencies that would be gained, was the motivating factors identified by optometrists to consider further education and training,” says Dr Naicker.

According to him, being in the educational fraternity for almost two decades and as a former education committee member of the professional board of optometry, he was able to see where the shortcomings were in the profession which set him on this path to pursue this research. With most optometrists in clinical practice and no clinical postgraduate qualifications available except pure research-based qualifications in SA, Dr Naicker explains that this hindered optometrists’ professional trajectory and career path opportunities into various special interest areas.

“By developing a framework for horizontal articulation pathways towards coursework postgraduate qualifications in various clinical specialty fields, this would be the contribution in addressing the educational gap that would guide higher education institutions in their programme development process. The beneficiaries of this expansion would not only be the health professionals but the patients who access optometric care from the optometrists who would have advanced skills and competencies to deliver comprehensive eye care services.”

Stayed motivated

Dr Naicker says the journey to his PhD was challenging from the outset as the country went into hard lockdown due the COVID-19 pandemic just five weeks after he registered for his PhD. Working on a PhD was not a priority at the time when your survival and that of your loved ones was uncertain as thousands of people fell victim to the coronavirus. Further to this, he continues, multiple changes to his supervisory team and the overhaul and revitalisation of the administration and management of the UFS Division of Health Sciences Education, also impacted his progress in his doctoral research at that time. He had felt despondent after a year of being registered when stability arrived with supervisory assistance that re-ignited his drive to pick up the slack and keep moving forward.

“The words ‘push through it’ were verbalised to me by a stranger I met in passing. While chatting about research I found those three words to be so profound and with such depth that they resonated with my experience of facing adversity but remaining vigilant to preservere and not drop the baton in the race against time to conclude my research. Gaslighting yourself and questioning your potential to complete a PhD only compounds your procrastination which was all too apparent. The goal is to rise above the self-doubt, brush off the devil with the fork sitting on your shoulder and just ‘push through it’.”

Dr Naicker, who is currently supervising four master’s of optometry students in their research undertaking, as well as undergraduate research projects, says he is in the process of publishing the research manuscripts generated from his PhD and is also part of a task team with the professional Board of Optometry for setting up the board exams for foreign-qualified optometrists. He would also like to work on research involving educating the educators of visually impaired learners.

News Archive

“My time at the UFS was the golden gem of my career”

2016-07-04

Description: Zig Gibson Tags: Zig Gibson

Prof Alan St Clair Gibson
Photo: Oteng Mpete

“My time at the University of the Free State (UFS) was the golden gem of my career. I have worked at medical schools or biomedical research centres in the United Kingdom, United States and at some of the top medical schools in South Africa, but working at the UFS was one of the highlights of my career,” says Prof Alan St Clair Gibson, Head of the UFS School of Medicine.

After spending just over two years at the UFS, Prof St Clair Gibson resigned from the institution in June 2016 and will take up the position of Dean: Health and Human Performance Sciences at the Waikato University in New Zealand in mid-July, where he will assist to establish a new faculty for all the health-science disciplines. “It was a privilege to work at the UFS. I come from a strong research background and wanted to grow research at the university, which I achieved. I came to the UFS because of the Academic and Human Projects and am proud of what has been achieved at the School of Medicine during the time I was here,” he said.

Prof St Clair Gibson highlighted some of these achievements, including the development of a management infrastructure across the disciplines of the school. “The establishment of an executive management committee for the school, as well as research champions in departments, highlighted the importance of proper governance and strategic management. By developing data dashboards, my management team and I could develop an understanding of research income and productivity, how the school works, what the role of teaching and learning is, and how the school could benefit in terms of third-stream income from the many contracts obtained by its academic staff. As a result, contracts and the financial management model of the school have also been reconfigured to the benefit of the university so that the institution and school can benefit from it,” he said.

His strong belief in an open-door policy has made staff feel part of the environment and it has created an atmosphere of equality and inclusivity. He believes in staff development and has, for instance, established leadership and management courses for heads of departments. Another factor to be proud of is the increase in the number of young researchers who recently joined the school, such as Prof Ross Tucker, who is one of the foremost sport scientists in the country. “It is a fact that staff retire or resign in all schools and departments of any university. It is also true that these departures offer opportunities to bring new academic and professional staff into the UFS. In fact, for the first time virtually every department in the School of Medicine now has a full-time Head of Department and 46 new staff were appointed since January 2015,” said Prof St Clair Gibson.

“I am especially proud of contributing, together with the senior leadership of the UFS, to stabilise the relationship with the Free State Department of Health (DoH). With the assistance of these parties, as well as my executive management team, we could find a better way of working together to the benefit of the school and the province.’’

Transforming the student profile to be representative of the country’s demographics is another milestone Prof St Clair Gibson will remember. “The intake of black and white students is of such a nature that we now have a much more balanced ratio of black and white undergraduate students than before.”

“I wanted to stay longer to see the effect of all the changes I made at the school, but the deanship is an offer I cannot refuse. I would have liked to see a steadier increase in the number of permanent clinical staff and have worked hard with both the UFS management and the DoH to try and achieve that; but more work needs to be done.”

I have worked with a number of fantastic staff members at the school, who are determined to do good in a challenging environment. I am amazed at the energy of the university leadership and how the Human and Academic Projects are executed. My wish for the university is to maintain and grow its standards and for the School of Medicine to maintain its reputation as one of the best schools in the country. I will always be a proud alumnus of the UFS,” he said.

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