OUR OPTICIANS AND STAFF AT Five Points Eye Care
Our exceptional eye care staff in Athens, Georgia look forward to helping you and your family with all your eye care needs. We will help you select the most appropriate frames or contact lenses and will meticulously fit your new glasses to meet your needs. At Five Points Eye Care, we are dedicated to optimizing your vision care.
Meet Our Team in Athens, Georgia
Heather joined Five Points Eye Care in 2022 as our Office Manager. With an extensive background in leadership development and management, she has fallen in love with the staff and patients at our office. Her top priority is to improve all areas of our office for staff and patients alike to create an exceptional experience for all. It’s not just about what we do, but how we do it. Outside of work, Heather loves to spend time with her husband and fur-babies (two beagles!). She also enjoys the art of crochet and creating unique, handmade gifts for friends and family.
As a Vision Therapist, Noemi supervises children with various eye problems including amblyopia (lazy eye) and focusing problems as they complete vision training to improve their vision and visual function. Noemi joined our practice in February 2008 and lives in Athens. She is fluent in Spanish, English and American sign language. She enjoys pet sitting, singing, dancing, traveling, and playing Pokémon Go.
End of Year Reflections:
We only get one set of eyes, knowing we improve people’s quality of life is very rewarding.
The atmosphere, the employees and we have amazing Doctors! Everyone here is amazing, fun, loving and kind. (Which is why I’ve been here 14 years.)
Seeing patients successfully do the orthokeratology program warms my heart. One patient who plays sports was sick of wearing glasses and now he can comfortably play sports and go swimming without the need of any correction during the day.
Abby grew up in nearby Jefferson and joined Five Points Eye Care in 2013 after working for several years in the service industry. She started as a full time Optometric technician and became National Contact Lens Examiners (NCLE) certified in 2017. She is now currently in charge of verifying insurance prior to patient’s appointments, in addition to helping with patient care in the clinic and being our full-time Clinic Care Coordinator. Abby enjoys spending time with her husband and his young daughter, loving on their four German Shepherds, watching UGA football, and relaxing with family and friends.
End of Year Reflections:
I love being a part of helping patients to be able to see – Growing up I’ve always had 20/20 vision, so I never really understood what it was like to not just be able to wake up and see. Working here over the past 10 years I’ve gained a new appreciation for having good vision, and for helping others to achieve that!
I love how the entire staff is like one big family. Each person in the office plays a key role in making us who we are. There’s not a day that someone doesn’t make me laugh until my sides hurt, even on days I don’t always want to laugh.
We have one older male patient that we all love, and he comes in just to see all of us on a monthly basis. Sometimes he brings us treats, and other times it’s just a laugh, a smile, and a hug. Either way, patients like him just make our days better!
Celeste joined Five Points Eye Care in August 2015. She is a graduate of Athens Technical College in Medical Assisting and works as one of our technicians as well as is our low vision rehabilitation coordinator. She currently lives in Danielsville with her young daughter. She enjoys reading, spending quality time with family and friends, traveling and being at the lake.
End of Year Reflections:
I was raised by my legally blind grandmother and now help to take care of her. So being the low vision technician I love helping my patients to be as independent as they can and see to the best of their ability. I love being able to share my experience and techniques that helped her to still do almost everything she wanted or needed to do to stay independent even with her significant vision loss and hopefully be able to help others be the same.
I love how it is one big family and we are always there to help each other on bad days or cheer each other on when needed. There is always someone around to laugh with or if you need it to give you a hug and cry with you when you need it.
One of my favorite is I had a patient that was really struggling with her vision loss and to be able to do the things she loved to do. I took my time and showed her devices and things to potentially help. I also explained a lot of things that previous offices had never explained to her. By the end of her appointment she was crying hugging me and thanked me for everything I did to help her.
Amber started with Five Points Eye Care as an optometric technician in May 2018. She is originally from Covington, GA and now lives in Danielsville, GA with her sons and husband. Her days are mostly spent at the lake, the ballfield, or staying inside to watch a good movie or playing video games.
End of Year Reflections:
Having fun and new experiences working with patients every day. It’s a great learning opportunity and I have fun each day helping patients.
I have made great relationships with both coworkers and patients!
My favorite positive story is when I had a patient mention that we have been the only office to figure out a cure for her headaches. She has gone to multiple offices and chiropractors who had a temporary fix, but nothing fully helped her. She has tried every medicine but Vision therapy. The neurolenses helped correct her vision and she now has headaches about once a month (or not at all) and feels we have changed her outlook on life.
Courtney joined our staff in 2021 and currently is our patient coordinator in our call center. She is the first person many of our patients have contact with since she answers most of our phone calls. She is a graduate of University of North Georgia in Criminal Justice and moved to Madison County, Georgia in 2013 where I met the love of her life, Josh. She has 3 very energetic boys, Kason, Grayson, and Charlie and spends most, if not all her time, outside of work with her family. She also has 2 dogs, a Labrador Retriever (Ranger) and a Weimaraner (Fisher). She enjoys the outdoors, reading, racing, and watching her children play sports.
I am very much a people person. I love talking to people daily. For me (as I am in the Call Center), I am really the first person a patient speaks to when they call our office. I love being able to help the patient schedule their appointment, order contacts, etc. It gives me a chance to get to know the patient a little bit through our small talk.
Everyone and I mean Everyone is so nice and compassionate. I’ve never worked or been in a setting where everyone friendly and enjoys being a part of a team. I love being behind the scenes of things and being able to schedule a patient’s appointment but also call them after their appointment to follow up and see how things went.
When I first started working here, I was clueless on Optometry. I had no idea how to order contacts or what certain terminology means. I asked tons of questions (probably more than I should have). A few months in, a new patient called to schedule an eye exam. The patient had tons of questions, just like me. I couldn’t answer all her questions but assured her that I would call her back with those answers. A short while later, I called her back and answered every question she had. The patient came to her appointment a few days later and then I found a card in my box from her. It was so sweet, and it made me feel like I had accomplished something so amazing!
Notice of Clinical Externs
Externship Definition
Externships are a series of clinical rotations to various sites for patient care away from the optometry school setting. The intent of externships is to provide the optometric student the opportunity to be trained by outstanding practitioners in primary and/or secondary care optometry. Externships are an integral part of the optometry school curriculum and are designed to transform the optometric student into a complete health care professional who can apply scientific knowledge in concert with clinical insight and overall concern for the patient. The student is expected to practice, under the instruction and guidance of the attending faculty, according to the highest standards of clinical, moral, and ethical conduct.
Why do we have externs?
Five Points Eye Care Center doctors are honored to be adjunct clinical faculty for The Ohio State University College of Optometry, The University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Optometry and Salus University Pennsylvania College of Optometry. Drs. Jon and Nadine Forche and Dr. Meg Brya are educators involved in the training process for externs. They provide clinical training in order to assist in the cultivating of our next generation of optometrists.
How will this affect me?
The extern is asked to gather detailed information from you, the patient, in relation to the examination and provide their review to their attending optometrist. At that point, your optometrist, Dr. Jon Forché, Dr. Nadine Forché or Dr. Meg Brya, will review the extern’s findings, perform their own examination and consult with you regarding your final diagnosis and treatment plan.
Although we believe our patient care is enhanced by our clinical externs, we understand that certain patients may prefer to be seen by a doctor following the preliminary work-up by a technician. Please let us know if that is your preference and we will note that in your medical record.