On behalf of the entire team here at Brookside Optometric Group, and all our patients, it’s been a pleasure working with Dr. Rosemary (Rosie) Melrose and Dr. Bob Melrose as they grew their practice. 

August 29, 1948 – September 22, 2022

We are saddened to announce that our friend and colleague, Dr. John Demshar, passed away on September 22. John was one of the original partners here at Brookside Optometric Group, and was a vital part of this practice until his retirement in 2019. Since his retirement, he devoted himself fully to his many charitable endeavors, as well as maintaining his connections with his fellow doctors, our staff, and his beloved patients here at Brookside. We have been honored to support his work with Lions in Sight, the Flying Samaritans, his annual Summerfest fundraiser, and the many other causes that he was involved with.

Drs Bob and Rosie Melrose represented Brookside Optometric at the 2022 UC Berkeley, Herbert Wertheim School of Optometry & Vision Science practice emersion program this year. The program is designed to give interns at the school a familiarity as to what they will encounter when they graduate and enter the world of patient care away from the academic environment.

Every January we write a year in review for the Brookside Optometric Group. The year 2021 was an interesting year for us as it was for everyone else.

The Covid pandemic impacted our professional lives just as it impacted the personal lives of each of our patients. While we did not have to shut down in 2021 as we did the year before many aspects of our care were impacted. We had to decrease our hours in the evenings as well as have one less doctor in each day to allow for social distancing which protected our patients, staff, and our doctors from Covid-19.

I was asked to write up our annual “2020 Year in Review” summary for our office. As I stared at my computer gathering my thoughts, I kept going back to the reality that while this year was simply one of the most challenging, stressful years that we have ever faced as a Brookside Optometric Group family it was also a year of discovery about the character and nature of our office family and of our patients.

After 20 years, it’s fun to reminisce about how and why the partners came together as Brookside Optometric Group. Professionals practicing in the same city get to know their colleagues, but several of us had pre-existing relationships. Since many of us have served on the faculty at the University of California, there were teacher-student relationships. For example, Drs. Hisaka, Prima and Demshar instructed me and I, in turn, instructed Dr. Vanover. Going back even further, Dr. Hisaka was Dr. Fujii’s Sunday school teacher!