Eyes during lockdown – Part 2.1

How to protect your vision from the ill effects of digital exposure during the current lockdown? 

While it will not be fair to ask you to stop your digital devise use given the current situations, let’s see how we can minimize it and when we do use screens, how can we best use them to cause minimum ocular stress.

I shall be sharing one point everyday with you all. 

1. Always wear your refractive correction 

Many people with minus numbers, (Myopia) think that the correction is only for distance. 

People with small cylinders (Astigmatism) don’t wear spectacles as they say they can still see without spectacles. 

People with Plus numbers (Hypermetropia) before the presbyopic age (around 40yrs) believe they have spectacles only for near.  

Yes, Myopes can see better for near than distance. But like I mentioned in my last article, it’s not just the clarity of vision but the comfort of vision and its mechanism what needs to be considered. When you look at near objects, multiple mechanisms are put into play within the eye, mainly accommodation and convergence. Both these processes are controlled by internal and external muscles of the eyes. Accommodation helps you to focus for near while convergence helps draw your eyes inwards to keep the eyes directed at the object of interest. There is a neural balance between these two mechanisms.  Not wearing your correction (spectacles/contact lenses) disturbs the balance which can lead to symptoms, either immediately or in the long run. 

Same applies to cylindrical numbers. A cylindrical number makes viewing in one meridian clear than the other. Squeezing the eyes or sometimes adopting a head tilt clears the image. Many a times the person is not even aware of these body postures they adopt. These short‐term adaptations in the visual system appear to reduce the perceived impact of astigmatism on vision. But the body is put in a continuous ‘Adjust Mode’ which exhibits itself as eye fatigue, head and neck pain and other ocular symptoms at some point. 

While both hypermetropia and presbyopia make near viewing difficult, hypermetropia is a refractive error requiring correction to be worn at all times, for distance and near, while presbyopia is a age related physiological condition needing correction for near viewing. Do not confuse between the two. Parents of children who are prescribed plus numbers panic more than the parents of children who get minus numbers since they have a notion that only old people wear plus numbers. I hope this article make you understand that this is not the case. The gravity of a child getting a plus number is similar to that of a child getting a minus number. Not wearing plus number makes your eyes use its focusing ability to compensate for the number and clear vision. However, this disturbs the balance and coordination within the eye, leading not just to eye strain but also putting the eyes at risk of squinting. 

Since viewing time of display devices has increased during the lockdown, make it a point to wear your ocular correction when viewing them. It’s a must for your spectacle lenses to have an   Anti-Reflection Coating so as to prevent glare and loss of image clarity. Viewing, especially after sundown can be made comfortable by enhancing your spectacle lenses with a Blue Protection. (I shall talk about this in the coming days)

Stay safe, Stay healthy

Mithali Paranjape +919890147825

                                            | Paranjpe Vision Care, F.C. Road | Paranjpe Eye Care. Karvenagar | +919823351184 |