Presbyopia is an unfortunate side effect of aging that a majority of people will go through at one point or another. While it can affect anyone, it is primarily a problem for people over 40 years of age. In short, this is when the lens of your eye starts to harden. While this doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t mean that you will not be able to focus on nearer objects or objects farther away. Additionally, the lighting can also affect your sight, especially lack of light. While bifocals used to be the only recourse that you had available to you, today contact lenses can also be used to not only improve your vision, but also help prevent eyestrain and blurred vision as well.
The contact lenses used to treat presbyopia are not your traditional contact lenses, rather they are closer to bifocals. To give you an idea of how they came to be, here is a quick look at previous treatment alternatives. The very first solution that was available to general public was your traditional bifocals and then trifocals. From there, the lenses used in glasses started to utilize a blending technology in which the glasses worked very similarly to trifocals, only instead of defined areas, everything slowly blended together. This got rid of distracting lines in the lenses.
From there, this same concept was applied to contact lenses. The lenses that you will use operate in a fairly similar manner as trifocals and are known as multifocal lenses. There are other options as well, however with current technologies, multifocal lenses are currently the preferred solution for both comfort and overall effectiveness. Currently, these types of lenses will help people get back to near perfect vision about 80% of the time, however they will almost always provide a vast improvement.
Just like every other available options, contact lenses do not yet provide a foolproof solution. However, they are effective for most people. Plus, they are currently the most effective option for people who don’t want to wear glasses. The multifocal contacts are even used by people who predominantly wear glasses. This is because there are certain activities in which glasses can easily get broken or the additional peripheral vision that contacts provide is necessary. For example, a range of sports and hobbies are better suited to contacts including basketball, baseball, football, jogging, hiking, fishing, and even golfing.
It should be apparent that even the latest contact lenses are not yet a complete cure for presbyopia. However, it will be able to treat most people effectively. If you are at or over the age of 40, this condition should always be kept in check. The stereotype that older people all have vision problems is based on a truth, which is that the older you get, the more at risk you are for this condition. Fortunately, by seeing an optometrist every year or every two years is often enough to keep you alert of your own situation. It doesn’t set in overnight, but rather it is a gradual change. Once you do need to take action, make sure to consult an optometrist because they may be able to tell you which technology will be best for your specific needs.
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