Acronyms and Anachronisms

Over the past 2 years, I have sensed an increase in the use of the initials FAAO by authors in optometric publications and presenters at continuing education meetings. I am delighted by this trend and it comes at a time when the Academy is undertaking a major recruitment effort through its Old Friends, New Fellows campaign. Regular readers of Optometry and Vision Science will know that we have an unwritten editorial policy of listing FAAO after the name of all authors who are Fellows of the Academy. The journal has a less well defined policy of listing academic and professional degrees. Given the diverse authorship and readership of the journal and the growing international membership of the Academy, this can lead to quite an array of letter strings. Academic degrees present, perhaps, the least amount of confusion. The degrees PhD, MS, and MA are universally recognized and acknowledged, and the scholarship associated with earning such qualifications is rarely questioned. There are, of course, a number of common variants on these graduate degrees, including MPH, MBA, MSEd, MPP, MPhil, etc., with which readers will also be familiar. Occasionally, readers will encounter a DPhil, a MA(Oxon), or MA(Cantab), all of which give clues to the degree-granting institution. DPhil is synonymous with PhD, whereas the suffix Oxon or Cantab indicates the degree is from the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge, respectively. Determining whether or not an author is an optometrist can also present a challenge to the naïve reader. Obviously, a North American trained optometrist will list his or her degree as OD, but what about the journal's growing international authorship? In many countries, optometry, like other professional programs, is not a postbaccalaureate degree. Instead, students enter the program directly from, or soon after, high school. Thus, many internationally trained optometrists’ optometry degree is a BS or a BSc. Some countries attach an automatic or optional suffix to indicate the nature of the qualification; for example, BOptom or BScOptom. Under my editorship, it is the Australians that have shown the greatest variety in optometric credentials. Over the past 2 years, authors have listed their qualifications as BAppSc(Optom), LOSc, BScOptom, BOptom, DipAppSc(Optom), and PGDipAdv ClinOptom, which, believe it or not, is an abbreviation! British authors can be equally perplexing to the unsuspecting reader. In order to become licensed, UK optometrists must pass examinations administered by the College of Optometrists who, until 1995, were the British College of Optometrists and, when I qualified in the mid ’80s were still the British College of Ophthalmic Opticians. Within the next few years, it is hoped that the College will become the Royal College of Optometrists and the letters that signify my membership of the College may change from MCOptom to MRCOptom, having started life as MBCO. Those British optometrists that qualified before 1980, along with the handful that have taken the College's fellowship examination, have the privilege of calling themselves Fellows and using FCOptom. I believe that the journal should extend international authors the courtesy of listing professional affiliations, but only when they signify licensure or certification as an optometrist that has been obtained by examination. I will admit that I am unsure how to treat other professional affiliations. For example, should we oblige an author when he or she asks to be listed as FCOVD (Fellow of the College of Optometric Visual Development)? What about someone who uses the letters FIACLE (Fellow of the International Association of Contact Lens Educators) or FIOS (Fellow of the International Orthokeratology Society) after his or her name? In the future, will some US optometrists be listing themselves as MBOP, as members of the American Board of Optometric Practice? In summary, the questions posed by this editorial may outnumber the answers. As the Editorial Board begins to revise the journal's Instructions to Authors, I would welcome input from the journal's readership.