Kiser Eye Care, Hickory: NPI Registry Record and Eye Exam Cost Context
What the registry record says
- NPI number
- 1417397027
- Legal business name
- Dr. Melanie S. Kiser PC
- Registered trading name
- Kiser Eye Care
- Primary registered specialty
- Optometrist (152W00000X)
- Practice location
- 1960 US Highway 70 SE
Hickory, NC 28602-5106 - Phone on the record
- (828) 323-8833
- NPI issued
- June 27, 2013
- Record last updated by the practice
- July 13, 2026
- Registry status
- NPI registry record, active as reported by CMS August 2026
- Metro area
- Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton, NC
- County
- Catawba County
- Location precision
- Street address matched by the US Census geocoder
Reading this record
The practice bills under the legal name Dr. Melanie S. Kiser PC and registered Kiser Eye Care as its trading name, so an insurance statement may show a name that does not match the sign on the door. The entry was refreshed in July 2026, putting it among the 8 of 30 Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton records updated in 2024 or later, so the contact details are more likely to be current than most of this metro.
For local context: Hickory holds 13 registered eye care practices in this snapshot, 8 of them optometry and 5 ophthalmology, in ZIP codes including 28602. 7 of them took an NPI before this practice did. The closest is Elite Family Eye Care in Hickory, 0.4 miles away.
None of this is a licensing check. CMS issues an NPI so a provider can be identified in billing transactions, and states plainly that issuance does not ensure or validate that the holder is licensed or credentialed. The North Carolina boards hold the licensing record, and the practice itself is the only source for what it charges today.
Nearest registered practices
34 other registered eye care practices sit within 25 miles of this address, a radius that does not stop at the metro boundary. Inside the Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton metro itself there are 30, 12 of them elsewhere in Hickory. The closest 5 are below, measured straight line between registered addresses.
| Practice | City | Registered as | Distance | Phone on record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elite Family Eye Care | Hickory | Optometry | 0.4 mi | (919) 608-2579 |
| Cos Eye Care, O.D., P.A. | Hickory | Optometry | 0.5 mi | (828) 929-5515 |
| Mountain View Eye Center | Hickory | Optometry | 2.5 mi | (828) 294-1010 |
| Jody Dale Papazekos OD | Hickory | Optometry | 2.7 mi | (828) 322-3154 |
| Viewmont Eye Associates PLLC | Hickory | Ophthalmology | 2.8 mi | (828) 322-4973 |
Distances are straight line between registered practice locations, not driving distance. Records placed at a ZIP centroid rather than a matched street address are excluded from this comparison.
What to expect to pay at an optometry practice like this
The NPI registry holds no prices, so nothing here is a quote from Kiser Eye Care. Based on this site's own price research, an independent optometry practice typically charges $120 to $200 for an exam without insurance, against a national average of about $136 and roughly $25 once a vision plan pays its share.
Ask two things when you call: whether the quoted fee includes the refraction, and what a contact lens fitting adds if you wear lenses, since that takes a visit to $150 to $370. A comprehensive exam is $100 to $250. If price is the deciding factor, the 30 practices on the Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton page give you the full local field to call around.