Learn more about our presenters for the pre-conference session – Bioptic Driving: Addressing the Transportation Needs of Persons with Visual Challenges
Rebecca A. Deffler, OD, PhD, FAAO
Dr. Deffler is an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University College of Optometry, where a portion of her duties include supervising fourth-year interns as a clinical attending in the Low Vision Rehabilitation Service, with a large portion of that work dedicated to assessing and counseling patients on driving safety and legality. She has completed advanced clinical training in low vision rehabilitation, and her PhD dissertation focused on laboratory-based hazard perception and naturalistic recording of on-road performance of bioptic drivers with central vision impairment. Her research interests include the delivery of low vision rehabilitation care and the interactions among vision and driving. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry, a recipient of the Alfred A. Rosenbloom Jr. Low Vision Residency Award, and a two-time Ezell Fellowship awardee.
Tom Porter, OD, FAAO
Dr. Porter is an Associate Professor and Director of Low Vision Services in Saint Louis University’s Department of Ophthalmology, and also serves as an Assistant Professor at the University of Missouri College of Optometry. Throughout his forty-five-year career, he has limited his practice exclusively to patients with low vision issues, with his clinic seeing more than 1,000 low vision patients each year. He has also served as a clinical consultant to several manufacturers of low vision aids and as a medical advisor to the Vision Council of America.
Gregory R. Hopkins, OD, MS FAAO, Dipl. AAO
Dr. Hopkins has been an optometrist since 2010, with a passion for low vision clinical practice, education, and research, and a focus on enhancing quality of life for partially sighted individuals through assistive technology. He has served as a preceptor at the Ohio State School for the Blind’s pediatric low vision clinic since 2012, holds a master’s degree in vision science, and completed a post-graduate clinical fellowship in low vision care in 2014. Since 2013, he has been a staff optometrist at the Columbus VA Eye Clinic, where he has refined low vision exam processes and was recognized for chairing a national committee on driving privileges for veterans. In 2023, he uniquely adapted CERNER EMR for low vision within the VA system, with the goal of fostering cohesive, multidisciplinary care for veterans with vision loss. He is a clinical diplomate in the American Academy of Optometry’s low vision section and has served as chief of the bioptic telescope glasses design and fitting clinic since 2019.
Bradley E. Dougherty, OD, PhD
Dr. Dougherty is an Associate Professor at the Ohio State University College of Optometry, where he also serves as a clinical attending optometrist in the Vision Rehabilitation Service. He completed his clinical and research training at Ohio State, earning both an OD and a PhD in Vision Science. His research spans several areas within low vision rehabilitation, including driving with vision impairment, assessment of patient-reported outcomes, and the relationships among stress, depression, and inflammation in macular degeneration. His PhD dissertation focused on bioptic telescopic driving in people with central vision impairment, and he has since expanded this work to encompass broader driving performance studies, a pilot study of road sign recognition in a driving simulator, ongoing naturalistic recording of drivers in their own vehicles, and a collaborative project using driving simulation to train new bioptic drivers. He also has extensive experience evaluating new technology for low vision rehabilitation, having conducted multiple studies of devices for reading and mobility. His research has been funded by the National Eye Institute, Research to Prevent Blindness, The Ohio State University Center for Clinical and Translational Science, and the Ohio Lions Eye Research Institute.
Mary Miller, OTR/L, CDRS, LDI
Ms. Miller is an occupational therapist and certified driver rehabilitation specialist who has been a bioptic driving instructor and member of the central Ohio bioptic driving program since 2021. She served on the research team for the 2024/2025 study “Bioptic Driving Simulator Training for Individuals with Central Vision Impairment” and brings years of experience in inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation, specializing in neurologic, orthopedic, cognitive, and visual conditions. She provides community presentations on a variety of driving topics, including Driving Safely while Aging, Autism and Driving, and Driver Rehabilitation Basics for the OT Practitioner. She is a 2013 Master of Occupational Therapy graduate of The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH.
Cindy Bachofer, PhD, CLVT
Dr. Bachofer is the low vision consultant at the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired (TSBVI) in Austin, TX, and a Certified Low Vision Therapist. She completed her doctorate at Vanderbilt University in 2013, with a dissertation titled “Long-Term Use of Optical Devices by Young Adults with Low Vision.” Her teaching interests include use of optical devices, print reading strategies, active transportation advocacy, instruction in eye anatomy, and psychosocial issues for students with low vision. She previously served as a teacher of students with visual impairments and as a consultant with Project PAVE (Providing Access to the Visual Environment) at Vanderbilt University from 2001 to 2008, and has also served as a literacy project leader with VISTA in Nashville and as an English instructor at both the secondary and post-secondary level in Kansas.
Chuck Huss, COMS, DRS
Mr. Huss is a certified orientation and mobility specialist and cross-trained driver rehabilitation specialist known nationally and internationally for his work and expertise in formalized bioptic driver training, assessment, and testing practices spanning more than forty years. He served as one of the principal researchers for the West Virginia Pilot Low Vision Driving Study from 1985 through 1988 and its continuum of related services through 2008, and shared full-time teaching responsibilities with four other professional staff within the West Virginia Bioptic Driving Program from July 2009 through January 2022. He is the recipient of the 2012 AER Ambrose Shotwell Award, a 2014 NOAH Distinguished Service Award, and a 2018 ADED Scholar’s Award, each recognizing his years of service, knowledge sharing, and professional advocacy in the field of bioptic driving. He is a 1976 M.A. graduate of Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI.