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Our Impact

See how the Academy and donor support for OPHTHPAC and the Surgical Scope Fund help secure victories for patients and ophthalmology. 

Ophthalmologists engaging with lawmakers

Protecting Patients. Advancing Ophthalmology.

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$896 million
Secured for the National Eye Institute (NEI) — and its independence preserved, derailing consolidation proposals.
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$125 million
ASC cataract surgery facility payment cut avoided by convincing CMS to fix its calculations.
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112 million
Americans across 13 states protected from unsafe surgical eye care standards in 2025.

Our Wins

Reforming the Medicare payment system is the cornerstone of our advocacy efforts. Donor support for OPHTHPAC enables us to work for a system that adequately recognizes and sustains all physician specialties and practice types to ensure patients have access to high-quality care. In 2025, Congress passed legislation providing physicians with a 2.5% Medicare payment increase for services provided in 2026, helping bring short-term stability to practices and patients.

We also prevented nearly a $125 million cut to cataract surgery facility reimbursement for ASCs by convincing CMS to correct flawed payment rate calculations.

Learn More: How the Academy advocates on Medicare

We believe patients deserve the highest standards of surgical eye care. The rigorous medical education and extensive clinical and surgical training that ophthalmologists undergo is the only path to providing safe eye surgery and protecting patient safety. Thanks to donor support for the Surgical Scope Fund, the Academy can oppose efforts — legislative or regulatory — that seek to grant optometrists surgical privileges without the appropriate education and hands-on training required to perform surgery safely. That training begins in medical school and continues through surgical residency under the direct supervision of a skilled ophthalmologist. The Surgical Scope Fund has achieved a 90% win rate for patient safety in hundreds of state legislative battles. 

Learn More: Surgical Scope Fund

The Academy tracks down and fixes administrative burdens that delay care and disrupt practices. We convinced Humana to resolve a problem in their claim processing algorithm. And we got Humana to reprocess 1.8 million wrongfully denied claims, resolving and restoring reimbursement.

Learn More: How the Academy advocates on administrative burden

We believe America’s standing as a global leader in vision research depends on robust federal investment. Thanks to donor support for OPHTHPAC, we defended the National Eye Institute from a plan to merge it into a broader institute and slash its budget in half. We led the effort to protect its independence and preserve its funding. We also helped restore $10 million to the Department of Defense vision research budget. We are also working to pass legislation that would establish the first national program to address children’s vision and eye health. It would expand access to vision screening and early intervention.

Learn More: How the Academy advocates on Public Health & Safety

Join Us in Protecting the Future of Eye Care

Every contribution strengthens our impact.

Ophthalmologists advocating for their profession on Capitol Hill

OPHTHPAC

The Academy’s political action committee, OPHTHPAC, advocates at the federal level for our members and the patients they treat on critical issues affecting ophthalmology.
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Three ophthalmologist eye surgeons in an operating room

Surgical Scope Fund

Help derail dangerous scope of practice expansion initiatives at the state level that put patient safety at risk by supporting the Surgical Scope Fund.
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