- OD, Pennsylvania College of Optometry, Salus University
- BSc/OD, University of Cape Coast, Ghana
- Ocular Disease Residency, Omni Eye Services, Atlanta
- Fellow, American Academy of Optometry (FAAO)
- Diplomate, American Board of Optometry
- NIH Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Alabama at Birmingham
- Associate Optometrist, Thomas Eye Center, Athens, GA
- Peer reviewer: IOVS, British Journal of Ophthalmology, Scientific Reports, and others
Researcher.
Clinician.
Consultant.
Dr. Sampson L. Abu is a board-certified medical optometrist based in Athens, Georgia, with a clinical focus on glaucoma, dry eye disease, neuro-ophthalmic conditions, and vascular ocular disease. He manages complex ocular disease at Thomas Eye Center and brings that patient care perspective directly to his consulting work.
His postdoctoral research at the University of Alabama at Birmingham was NIH-funded and focused on novel strategies for early detection of glaucoma progression, including individualized structure-function models, postprocessed visual field analysis, and real-world medication adherence in glaucoma patients. He trained under Dr. Lyne Racette, one of the leading researchers in glaucoma perimetry.
His work has appeared in Ophthalmology, Translational Vision Science and Technology, Scientific Reports, Journal of Glaucoma, PLOS ONE, and more than a dozen other peer-reviewed journals. He has presented original research at ARVO, the World Glaucoma Congress in Helsinki, the North American Perimetric Society, and multiple American Academy of Optometry annual meetings. He reviews manuscripts for Investigative Ophthalmology and Vision Science, the British Journal of Ophthalmology, and several other journals.
Dr. Abu was born in Ghana and completed his optometry training across three countries before his postdoctoral fellowship in the United States. For pharmaceutical companies thinking about diverse patient populations, health equity data, or sub-Saharan African markets, that background is directly relevant. His published work includes research on glaucoma medication adherence conducted in Ghana, one of very few studies of its kind from that region.
His research informs his clinical decisions, and his clinical practice keeps his research grounded. That feedback loop is what makes his consulting input different from what you get from a full-time academic or a retired clinician.