7 Things Contact Lens Wearers are Doing Wrong

According to a recent study by CDC United States (Center for Disease Control & Prevention) approximately, 41 million American wear contact lenses. Shockingly; nearly all of them are involved in one or more unhygienic contact lens habits. Consumers due to ill-practices suffer from contact lens induced infections, but at the end of day they ignorantly hold their contact lenses responsible.

Wearing substandard circle lenses, or failing to take meticulous care of your contacts, lead towards acute injuries. This may reduce future contact lens tolerance or above all can be fatal. Contrary, FDA approved Korean circle contacts ensure minimum risks as they are manufactured under state-of-art laboratories. Furthermore, ISO and other health certifications born by these lenses guarantee health & safety. Your health is in your own hands. Take a check on the following unhygienic 7 practices to prevent yourself from unfortunate ocular injuries.

1. Dealing contact lenses without washing your hands with soap and water
2. Sleeping, washing, showering without removing circle contacts
3. Failing to rub, rinse & disinfect circle lenses after each time they are worn
4. Ignoring to rinse the contact lens cases
5. Continuing to use circle lenses & cases past their expiry
6. Adding new solution to the old solution for soaking your contacts
7. Sharing contacts with friends & family.

The study found that almost all of the contact lens wearers tend to willingly ignore the following aspects of contact lens cleanliness. The US based contact lens survey was conducted online where 99% of the respondents were involved in one of the following risky attitudes.

1. 82.3% of them are involved in using their lens cases for more than 3 months
2. 55.1% of the respondents admit that they are too lazy to throw old solution & refill the lens chambers with a fresh supply. So they rely to contact lens solution topping.
3. 50.2% of the participants confess sleeping whilst wearing circle lenses.

With latest advancement contact lenses have become the cheapest & perfect mode of vision correction. However, one should not forget that they are prosthetic medical devices and not over-the-shelf beauty accessory. Use circle lenses only if you are mature enough to take care of them.  Lack of maturity is a no question. It does not even make your spectacles break-proof!

Why Monitoring Eye Health should be One’s Top Priority when Wearing Contact Lenses?

courtesy: Starfocal

It is a universal bad habit that we tend to ignore eye health when it comes to monitoring over-all body health. Doctors opine that monitoring eye health should be one’s top priority if you wear prescription contact lenses. Annual checkups & regular follow ups can help over rule the chances of contraindications you have been unaware of.

Eyes are windows to the soul. The idiom seems to carry the load of heavy meanings not only in serving to one’s aesthetics but also in clinical terms. Eyes show discomfort and various signals when your body suffers from other medical conditions; you have been oblivious of. For instance; you might get migraines due to the changing prescription of your contact lenses. Therefore; eye health exam should be made on priority basis once in a year if not in every 6 months.

Contact Lenses Need Attention:

People wearing contact lenses should be more vigilant about how their eyes behave when they shift to different temperature zones. Weather changes may also interfere with vision for patients wearing prescription contact lenses. With the onset of spring the suspended pollen particles in air might accumulate on the surface of contact lenses, causing blurred/hazy vision or might even spark allergic reactions. Similarly, beach visits in summer & tours to frozen areas might create discomfort whilst sporting contact lenses. Using mere eye drops help in various issues but serious concerns are better justified by an Optometrist. Only he will be able to judge if you should continue wearing contact lenses when allergens hit or should better give your eyes a rest.

Contact lenses have never been a problem. Eye experts opine that they wish to see more people opting contact lenses as they have been a handy device in vision correction for people from different walks of life, from children to elderly, from house wives to sportsmen with vigorous activities. Only follow instructions that come with your contact lenses & keep contact lens follow ups in your priority list. Guard your eyes against irrevocable vision damages- start acting today. 

Some Facts about Contact Lens Fitting

Contact lenses are not one-size-fit-all. Yet, there are some simple rules about contact lens fitting, as the average size of a human iris is 14mm. Contact lenses with a base curve of 8.6 mm fits most of the people whilst the water content of 38% keep circle lenses moist & your eyes hydrated.

Meeting your Eye Care Professional

1. If you are wearing contact lenses for refractive index correction, you should meet your ophthalmologist for prescription needs such as astigmatism.
2. People who wear contact lenses for personality enhancement should also meet eye care professional as there are several conditions that might affect contact lens tolerance such as the use of certain medication like birth control pills.  
3. An eye care service provider will check your eyes to see if you are a successful candidate of contact lenses. Depending on your eye types; he will recommend you contact lenses that will fit your eyes whilst ensuring the maximum comfort.

Health of Cornea

• One should take note of the corneal health. Tear film evaluation often describes how your corneas behave with contact lenses. Some people find it uncomfortable to wear contact lenses. This happens because of the quick degeneration of lipid that is actually the upper most layer of tear-film; serving as the barrier between foreign substances and your eyes.

• In case of dry eyes syndrome; use FDA approved authentic eye drops. Not everyone needs eye drops. Circle lenses with water content 38% and above are comfortable to most of the eyes. However; people with sensitive eyes may opt for circle lenses above 50% water content or disposable circle lenses.

• If your eyes go worst when allergy season hits then you need to be extra careful & vigilant about the health of your eyes. This is how to manage contact lenses with allergies. (Also read: Contact Lenses, Dry Eyes & Winter)

• If you spend bigger portion of your day at working on computer then you are more likely to suffer from computer vision syndrome. Since working at computer alters the “blinking-rate” it indirectly affects the tear film production & aggravates the symptoms with contact lenses. This is how to manage contact lenses with computer vision syndrome.