A group of kids holds up the blanket
they made for children affected by
illness and disease at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital with Professional VisionCare.
LEWIS CENTER, Ohio—For the team at Professional VisionCare, getting involved with the local community is written in their DNA. It’s something every employee carries close to their heart, as well as something this independent practice’s management is wholly committed to. Professional VisionCare is an independent practice in Ohio with four locations. Practice director Raquel Miller explained that, each year, they virtually survey all staff, crowdsourcing ideas for local involvement events that “serve our community.” This allows Professional VisionCare staff to give a platform to causes close to their heart, and gives the whole practice a multitude of causes to choose from for their major events each year.

This year, the staff at Professional VisionCare engaged with their community in a brand new way. On Saturday, March 9, staff from all their locations, along with community members, local businesses and a local Girl Scout troop, gathered at Professional VisionCare’s Lewis Center location to hand make hats blankets, and pillows for children affected by illness and disease at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital, in Columbus, Ohio. The event was the brainchild of this year’s annual staff survey, said Miller, and one that everyone agreed “was an amazing, amazing idea.”

The event was open to everyone, no matter how crafty they considered themselves to be, and Professional VisionCare provided both materials and tutorials to those who needed them. It was an event that anyone could get involved in, that helped an indie practice bond with its local community, and that made a tangible difference in peoples lives. In all, the group made 18 blankets, 17 hats and three pillows, according to Max Miller, optician and marketing coordinator at Professional VisionCare.

But this drive isn’t a one-off. Community engagement is a constant at Professional VisionCare. “Every year we do a Help For The Homeless drive, that’s open to the public,” Miller explained. “The cool thing is, social media has allowed us to reach other people who want to contribute.” Last year alone, Miller estimated, they had about a “U-Haul truck’s worth of donations.”


Members of the Professional VisionCare community
spent their Saturday at PVC's Lewis Center location,
knitting hats for children affected by illness and
disease at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital.
Miller and Carole Burns, OD, FCOVD, co-founder of Professional VisionCare, are particularly proud of another community initiative—Penny Wars. Earlier this year, each of the four departments within Professional VisionCare chose a charity to raise pennies for. The departments created social media campaigns, and competed against one another to raise the most pennies for their chosen charity. By the end of January, Professional VisionCare raised 15,775 pennies, and donated all that money to Cosba, a charity that supports families with children who have spina bifida.

The Professional VisionCare team engages in smaller events throughout the year, too. They donate books and fans to schools in need, make cards for members of the military, bring breakfasts to teachers and more. Getting involved in the community has helped the independent practice carve out a unique space in the community, and has brought even more purpose to their practice.

“I think it’s really neat,” Miller said. “We like to create that opportunity to band together, and our community is passionate about that too.”