Job Check
Ophthalmic Medical Technologists
Assist ophthalmologists by performing ophthalmic clinical functions and ophthalmic photography. Provide instruction and supervision to other ophthalmic personnel. Assist with minor surgical procedures, applying aseptic techniques and preparing instruments. May perform eye exams, administer eye medications, and instruct patients in care and use of corrective lenses.
10 main tasks · most important first
Your main tasks and AI
Importance- 01Conduct tonometry or tonography tests to measure intraocular pressure.Mostly human for now
- 02Take and document patients' medical histories.People already use AI for this at work
- 03Take anatomical or functional ocular measurements, such as axial length measurements, of the eye or surrounding tissue.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 04Measure visual acuity, including near, distance, pinhole, or dynamic visual acuity, using appropriate tests.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 05Administer topical ophthalmic or oral medications.Mostly human for now
- 06Measure and record lens power, using lensometers.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 07Calculate corrections for refractive errors.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 08Collect ophthalmic measurements or other diagnostic information, using ultrasound equipment, such as A-scan ultrasound biometry or B-scan ultrasonography equipment.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 09Perform ophthalmic triage, in the office or by phone, to assess severity of patients' conditions.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 10Clean or sterilize ophthalmic or surgical instruments.Mostly human for now
Tasks from O*NET® 31.0 (US Department of Labor, CC BY 4.0, changed by us), most important first. “Already use” comes from Anthropic’s data on real work chats with Claude; “could speed up” from task ratings made with GPT-4 in 2023.
Four studies, side by side
None is a forecast of job loss4%of this job’s work time goes to tasks that people already do with Claude at work, counting tasks where AI only helps as half (2026).Anthropic, 2026
37%of this job’s tasks an AI model could do in half the time, counting tasks that need extra tools as half (rated in 2023).Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin and Rock, 2023
Above 29% of jobsin how often and how well AI helped with this job’s work in Microsoft Copilot chats (2024 data).Microsoft Research (Tomlinson et al.), 2025
Above 72% of jobsin how much of this job’s physical work robots have been shown to do, from factories to homes (2026).Anthropic, 2026
Your human edge
The main tasks with no real AI use seen and no big speed-up expected. This is where your skill counts most today.
- Conduct tonometry or tonography tests to measure intraocular pressure.
- Administer topical ophthalmic or oral medications.
- Clean or sterilize ophthalmic or surgical instruments.