Have you ever considered wearing contact lenses?
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By: Glad Taylor
or some patients the fitting of contact lenses is the best way forward to ensure the best vision. For others, it’s a cosmetic luxury, as a complete facial change to wearing glasses. The main consideration is to ensure you are fitted by an Optometrist with a good knowledge and hands on experience of all the Contact Lens types and a very personalised approach to Contact lens fitting. Let’s first consider the replacement of glasses, either for occasional wear or for more permanent usage. For most people there is a soft contact lens which can work for you. These can be daily wea, two weekly wear or annual replacement lenses. Some of this is down to your choice and your budget. Daily lenses are throw away and you don’t need to buy cleaner. Longer wear lenses are less expensive but need to be soaked and cleaned on a daily basis.
Don’t worry if you have bifocal or progressive lenses in your glasses … there are Bifocal and Monofocal Contact lenses which can give you the same vision. As we get older our eyes are a little drier, so ensuring you use liquid tears, to keep the eyes moist, makes wearing contact lenses, over forty, much easier. Any person who is myopic ( short sighted ),and particularly people with a higher shortsighted prescription, usually have much more success with Gas Permeable Contact Lenses . These really need a knowledgeable expert to take accurate keratometer readings to get a superb fit. But gas permeable lenses, although a little more expensive in the first place, last usually for two years, so work out as an economical long term contact lens purchase. For some patients with other medical problems a contact lens is vital and not just a luxury. There is a disease of the Cornea called Keratoconus . The cornea grows slowly into a peak and could rupture and the vision would be lost. By fitting a special Keratoconus Contact Lens this can help to
flatten the cornea and stop or delay any corneal thinning, before further treatment with collagen cross linking or a corneal transplant is needed. If anyone loses an eye due to an accident then fitting a prosthetic contact lens can give a much pleasanter appearance. No vision, of course from it, but it can be made to look almost like a natural eye In the last twenty years the development of contact lens options and their uses has been amazing. But even now, there are advances on the doorstep where Glaucoma patients can be fitted with a contact lens which has a time release to administer the drops to stop the further onset on Glaucoma. If you would like to try contact lenses, find an expert to advise and fit them accurately. Ensure you are shown how to insert and remove the lenses, how to clean them .. and NEVER sleep in normal contact lenses unless they are specifically meant for overnight use! ¤ Glad Taylor is a well established entrepreneur in Saint Lucia and the owner of the Vision Express Group of Eye Care Centres. BusinessFocus Sept / Oct
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