Travel tips for contact lens wearers
Keep your eye on your contact lens regimen if youre traveling this summer. Being prepared when traveling is key to eye safety, said Dr. Andrew Pucker, an associate professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Optometry.
While the vast majority of contact lens wearers believe they are compliant, up to 90 percent of patients fail to accurately complete at least one step of their care regimen, Pucker noted.
Either they wear contact lenses for more days than recommended, keep them in overnight, expose their lens to tap water or fail to fully follow the cleaning instructions given to them by their optometrist, he said.
Taking shortcuts in your eye care while traveling can exacerbate bad habits or create new dangers.
Here, Pucker provides tips about contact lens safety for vacationers:
Consider your destination: Not all travel destinations have the same resources as the United States, Pucker said. You could lose your lenses and have no way to replace them, encounter pollution or not have access to clean water, he added.
If youre going to an underdeveloped country, consider leaving your contacts home to avoid the risk of eye irritation or infection, he said.
Also, remember to pack travel-sized bottles of contact lens solution and leak-proof contact lens cases.
Its also smart to pack extra contact lenses and a pair of eyeglasses.
Remember to remove your contacts before swimming. Otherwise, you risk developing an eye infection. If you need your lenses to see while swimming, he suggested daily disposable lenses you can discard when you finish your laps.
Protect your eyes from the suns ultraviolet rays by wearing polarized sunglasses, UV-protection contact lenses if applicable and a large-brimmed hat.
UV-protecting contact lenses protect only part of the eye, Pucker said. Sunglasses also provide protection, though neither contact lenses nor sunglasses fully protect the eyes from harmful light, he explained.
He recommended a combination of measures, such as sunglasses, contact lenses when needed for vision correction, and hats. Children are more susceptible to UV damage than adults, and should always be protected from the suns harmful rays, he said.
About 45 million people in the US wear contact lenses and most of them do it wrong, according to a new study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Almost 90 percent of US adults said they either slept with lenses, did not replace them as often as prescribed, or did some other dirty thing that would make your eye doctor lose it. The CDC would like you to stop: not wearing your contacts properly ups your risk of eye infections, and can even make you go blind.
contacts dont slip down your nose and they dont fog up
There are a number of advantages to using contact lenses over glasses: lenses correct your vision and allow you to see all around, without slipping down your nose if youre sweaty.
Also, they dont fog up when you enter a warm place in the winter, making you look like a dork. But if lenses are not cleaned or worn properly, they can lead to eye infections. Germs easily stick to the contact lens and can infect your eyes. If bacteria and viruses invade your cornea, you can have vision problems, or even lose your sight.
For this study, the CDC used a survey of over 4,500 US adults and over 1,600 kids ages 12 to 17 to check how they use contact lenses. They found that 85 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds (six in seven kids who wear lenses) reported at least one bad habit that increases their chance of an eye infection. Among adults, the percentage is even higher: 87 percent.
HealthDay
