6th, November 2019 | Oh Jinna
Avoid Contact Lens Problems with these Safety Tips
You might have encountered a few problems with your contact lenses at some point, and have no idea how to go about them.
Dealing with the stressful troubles of contact lenses can be challenging and the discomfort that it brings is just a little too much to handle.
It is especially hard if you don’t have the reliable sources that you can trust to help you look into the remedies and search for appropriate solutions.
You will not be surprised if you know that what you have gone through, might have been the same problem as your friend who uses contact lenses.
In this article, you might find the problem you have been experiencing with your contacts listed in here.
As you read on and unto the latter part, you will know the ins and outs of the most reported problems common with contact lenses and the safety tips that can help you prevent these problems.
Daily Wear Contact Lens
Many, if not all, contact lens wearers choose the daily wear contact lenses over any other type of contact lenses that are available.
To put it simply, daily wear contact lenses are those lenses you typically insert every morning and remove every night.
This is how it’s applied since it is not advisable to wear it during when you sleep.
When properly cleaned and stored, one pair of daily wear lenses should supposedly last up to a whole year.
In most cases, there is a handful of people out there that have opted for contact lenses and have used it as a substitute for glasses, allowing you to dispense with them.
Here are some of the reported problems with contact lenses and the safety tips that can help you take care of the health of your eyes.
Common Contact Lens Problems
Let’s first start off with the problems of contact lenses. For the most part, contact lenses are used as a convenient alternative if you don’t want to wear glasses or to avoid the use of bifocal glasses for those who are presbyopia or those who have trouble with near vision activities such as reading.
These lenses are in adherence according to each and specific conditions such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism.
However, these lenses are susceptible to complications that can cause you problems too. And you might not have realized it but you might have been the one who brought these troubles on yourself.
Here are the most common contact lens problems that people experience, and in some grave cases suffer from:
Eye Infection
If you have been wearing your contact lenses for far too long without applying the necessary precautions, watch out. You might need to take a step back and assess yourself.
Eye infection is primarily caused by an over worn or skewed contact lenses, a change in the eyes requiring new lenses, poor fitting of the lenses, poor care of the lenses, sensitivity to solutions, or intangible particles getting under the lens on the surface of the eye.
These relatively minor poor care management will grow to be as dangerous over time because the accumulation of all these bad practice would likely signal the outbreak of the infection called corneal ulcers.
For some of the ladies, makeup is an essential part of their everyday routine. However, one of the leading causes of eye infection, out of the many, is makeup.
Makeup can get under the crevices of the lens and can ultimately result to irritation, making it difficult for you to see clearly.
Sometimes polishing in the office will be necessary to remove this film. If not, it may be imperative to replace the lens that you have.
Contact Lens Irritation
Irritation may occur as a result of worn-out lenses, over-wear of lenses, poor care of lenses, intolerance to solutions, or infections. Irritation may also occur from poor hygiene on the part of the lens wearer.
If worn longer than recommended or in people whose eyes are particularly sensitive, deposits may develop on the surface of the lenses and cause irritation.
In an effort to save financial resources, some people have created and used their own homemade or non-contact-lens saline solutions when cleaning their contact lenses. And that right there is a red flag.
If you must know, these solutions may cause severe irritation or blinding infections that is because for some saline solutions, they are not as sterile as you might think, and they should never be used at all.
Eye Inflammation
Often times, eye infection and eye inflammation are mistaken as one and the same.
However, with eye inflammation on the other hand, the tissues that you have in your eyes are being taken over and destroyed slowly due to substance that somehow went in your eye.
Eye inflammation is caused by the protein deposits or by-products of bacteria that adhere to the surface of a contact lens.
They cause the cornea and conjunctiva to become inflamed because of an immune reaction.
The result is a condition called acute red eye. Protein from the tears of the eyes gather up on the surface of a contact lens all the while being worn.
Acute red eye is only one of the conditions, used as an example, that develops out of eye inflammation.
There are still a few conditions left undiscussed such as uveitis just to name one. If you’re not very careful and cautious, another type of condition could progress that’s even worse.
Safety Tips? Eyes here!
If you have noticed, it seemed that all the problems of the contact lens leads to one thing. And that is poor contact lens care.
It all goes back to how bad you have handled and worn your contact lens.
Now that these problems are presented, it is clear that as a contact lens wearer, it is their rightful job to take in what they can and faithfully follow the things that will help them to improve and alter their intolerable practices.
If they will keep these safety tips in mind, they will surely have a high chance that they can avoid and, for some, would have had avoided the contact lens problems before.
Here are some of the safety tips that one contact lens wearer must be aware of, and hopefully adhere for their own good:
- Wash your hands with soap and water. Dry them well with a clean cloth before touching your contact lenses every time you will clean them.
- Keep water away from your contact lenses. Avoid showering in contact lenses, and remove them before using a hot tub or when you go for a swim.
- Rub and rinse your contact lenses with contact lens disinfecting solution—never water or saliva—to clean them each time you remove them.
- Rub and rinse your contact lens case with contact lens solution—never water—and then empty and dry with a clean and new piece of tissue. Store upside down with the caps off after each use.
- Don’t “top off” solution. Use only fresh contact lens disinfecting solution in your case and never mix fresh solution with your old and especially used solution.
- Don’t sleep in your contact lenses unless prescribed by your eye doctor for those extended wear contact lens.
- Never store your contact lenses in water. Use the appropriate cleaning solution and take the proper sterilization steps.
- Replace your contact lenses as often as recommended by your eye doctor and follow them religiously.
- Always use the correct contact-lens solution recommended by the fitter. If you want to change solutions, you should first check with your fitter because some solutions may be incompatible with certain lenses.
- Replace your contact lens case with new ones at least once every three months.
- Use only the contact lens solution recommended by your eye doctor. Do not use any soap or cleaning liquids to clean your contact lenses.
References:
https://www.cdc.gov/contactlenses/protect-your-eyes.html
https://www.emedicinehealth.com/contact_lenses/article_em.htm
https://www.emedicinehealth.com/contact_lenses/article_em.htm#contact_lens_facts
https://www.mastereyeassociates.com/eye-care-news-blog/contact-lens-acute-red-eye-inflammation
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