2 Tips To Help Protect Your Eyes And Vision
Posted on: 19 May 2017
Keeping your eyes healthy and maintaining your sight is important to do if you are young or old, if your vision is perfect, or if you wear corrective lenses. Knowing some of the risk factors for eye conditions, damage, infections, and diseases is an important part of caring for your eyes and your sight. Here are two recommendations you can implement in your life to keep your eyes and vision in a good state of health.
Protect and Rest Your Eyes
Your eyes need protection throughout the day and when you complete risky activities that can potentially cause harm to your eyes. If you work at a job that requires you to use protective eye wear, be sure to wear it at all times to keep your eyes safe.
When you go outside, be sure to wear sunglasses that protect your eyes by blocking out harmful ultraviolet rays. Just short walks outside each day can increase your chances of ultraviolet damage to your eyes.
When buying sunglasses, look for lenses that block UVA and UVB rays, both of which can lead to macular degeneration and cataracts when your eyes are exposed too much to the sun's rays. Sunglasses that wrap around the sides of your face can block more harmful sun rays than traditional sunglasses can.
If you work at a computer each day, limit your time looking at the computer monitor by taking short breaks for your eyes. Follow the 20-20-20-rule, which has you take a break every 20 minutes by looking away from your computer monitor to approximately 20 feet in front of you for 20 seconds. Following this rule throughout your work day can help you reduce eye strain, blurry vision, dry eyes, headaches, and trouble focusing at a distance. Set a timer on your cell phone to remind you every 20 minutes to perform this quick exercise.
Take Care of Your Contact Lenses
If you are one of the more than 30 million Americans that wear contact lenses, it is a good idea to follow all the recommended guidelines by your optometrist to take care of your lenses and your eyes.
Depending on the type of eye contacts you wear, you may need to remove them at night so your eyes can breathe and absorb oxygen. Keeping your contacts in day and night can irritate your eyes and can cause inflammation and eye problems. The problems you can encounter by abusing your contacts in this manner can cost you your eye sight or your ability to even wear contacts. If you want the convenience of wearing your contacts day and night, talk to your eye doctor about the right type of lens that will accommodate this lifestyle.
Be sure to wash your hands with soap and water before each time you handle your lenses. Your hands can contain bacteria and organisms that will end up on your lenses and on your eye to cause infections and other problematic and harmful issues. Always rinse your contacts with a lens cleaning solution recommended by your eye doctor and not tap water. Tap water can contain a microorganisms called Acanthamoeba, which can give you a serious eye infection.
Rinse out your contact case each day with lens cleaner, dry it with a clean cloth, and keep it stored upside-down on a clean cloth until you need it again for your contact storage. Bacterial bio films can grow and develop on your lens case if you don't clean them properly each day or fail to use lens cleaner to rinse them. Replace your lens case with a new one every few months to prevent the build-up of any contaminants and bacteria.
Use these two tips along with visiting your eye doctor, as needed, to keep healthy eyes and vision.
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