With today’s active lifestyles, how often should you have your vision checked?
This question is often overlooked, even though dentists have long recommended regular visits. Eye doctors, however, remain in the shadows, and many of us do not know how often we should see them.
Recommendations for seeing an eye doctor usually start with a frequency of every two years until age 40, and then move to annual exams. This is because age-related changes begin to occur around age 45, when farsightedness begins. Finding the right correction becomes important, and regular exams help in this process.
The lens inside the eye, which is naturally convex on both sides, changes over time. These changes allow the eye to focus light on the retina and adjust vision to different distances. However, as the lens ages, and by the age of 40-45, a dense nucleus has formed that interferes with its full function.
Patients who used to see 100% may need to wear glasses for near vision, especially if they had problems with farsightedness. This leads to some misconceptions, such as the myth that you should not have surgery on eyes with minus vision, but should only use glasses for close reading.
If you are used to wearing glasses with minus lenses for distance vision and reading, as you age, especially after the age of 45, you will need to take them off occasionally to see near objects clearly. This is because age-related changes in the eye make it more difficult to focus light rays. As you move from distance to near vision, the focus shifts and you need different glasses, such as those with plus lenses.
Glasses with plus lenses add plus correction for near vision, but the minus correction for distance remains. So your overall vision doesn’t improve, but your near vision becomes more comfortable. Minus lenses with a progressive zone or the ability to change lenses in different situations are new technologies that allow you to adapt to different needs without constantly changing your glasses.
It is important to remember that the decision to wear glasses depends on your individual vision. Whether or not to wear minus 0.75 glasses is not just a matter of myth or truth. It depends on how well you can see at a distance and how comfortable you feel without glasses in everyday life.
These processes are measured by an instrument called an autorefractometer, which measures the refraction of the eye. This device, which is used in modern clinics where we place our chin and forehead, measures how light rays are focused in your eyes. When you look at objects, such as a house or a blimp in a green environment, the device determines how far away and how the rays focus at the back of your eye, on the retina. This measurement is related to the axial length of the eye and the differences between normal vision, nearsightedness (myopia) and farsightedness (hyperopia).
Under normal conditions, light rays should focus on the cornea (the transparent part of the eye) and then break on the retina, creating an image in the brain. In a nearsighted eye, which is usually longer, the rays focus in front of the retina, requiring the use of glasses to correct them. In contrast, a hyperopic eye is usually shorter and the rays focus behind the retina, also requiring the use of glasses.
However, the instrument does not measure refraction alone. It does not take into account the work of the eye muscles, which are actively involved in correcting focus. Therefore, even if the device shows a certain value (for example, 0.75), real conditions require individual correction, taking into account the activity of the eye muscles.
But all this is individual, and the myth that glasses make the eyes lazy is not true. Because without glasses, the eyes can overstretch and vision will progress.
Therefore, the frequency of visits to the eye doctor depends on age and individual vision characteristics. Regular check-ups will help to detect problems in their early stages and preserve vision in the best possible way.