A nurse from Edinburgh Royal Infirmary Emergency Department spoke to us about her laser eye surgery experience through the Thanks a Million campaign. The campaign was relaunched for the second time in 2023 and is dedicated to celebrating the hard work of NHS and Emergency Service workers by providing them with another £1 million worth of free laser eye surgery.

Stephanie has “lots of visual demands” that comes with her role as staff nurse in particular when she treats patients, being able to read monitors/boards from quite a fair distance and of course to be able to provide the best treatment she can provide to her patients.

She mentioned that “wearing glasses can be quite challenging” especially during COVID and having to wear masks and her glasses would constantly steam up. She even commented that during certain times doing CPR on patients her glasses have falling down or off leading her to just “firing them to the side”.

Starting medical school in September, Stephanie was eager to have visual freedom to clearly see the board during class. But also, to be able to drive freely without the worry or stress of forgetting her glasses. She enjoys walking/running with her dog, so to be glasses free would enable her to enjoy these moments a lot more.

After applying for the Optical Express Thanks a Million campaign, Stephanie said that she “felt quite elated” to be successful for free laser eye surgery.

Speaking about her experience, she mentions that the staff have been really kind and helpful and had answered all of her questions.

One day after her surgery Stephanie “felt really good” and said that she could “see everything around me which I normally wouldn’t be able to”. Describing her vision as “amazing” and being told she has better than 20/20 vision, Stephanie is ecstatic to say that the world looks really bright, really nice on this beautiful, sunny day in Edinburgh”.

It is the second time that Optical Express has chosen to thank NHS and Emergency Service workers in this way. In 2017, they launched their first ‘Thanks a Million’ campaign which saw them give away £1 million worth of free laser eye surgery. Over the course of the two campaigns more than £2 million worth of surgery will improve the lives of NHS and Emergency Service workers.

Since Optical Express was founded 32 years ago, the team are proud to have supported hundreds of humanitarian and philanthropic projects, donating over £33 million and counting to worthwhile causes in the UK and abroad.