so if you are someone that suffers from eye strain you know that sore pulling sensation
that's between the eyes behind the eyes and can even lead to eye strain headaches?
then this is the video for you because i'm going to show you how to get rid of eye strain
by incorporating seven lifestyle tips that'll help you with eye strain relief let's take a look
this video is brought to you by our friends at Dr. Lite offering the first and only medical grade
lamps to eliminate harmful blue light with custom LEDs and patented blue light absorbing filters.
helping me see clearly throughout the day with better comfort and less eye strain. Thank you to
Dr. Lite for helping us stay focused on eye care. hello and welcome this is Dr Allen here from the
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now first off what is eye strain simply put it eye strain is basically the over use of your eyes
a defocus where your eyes are constantly trying to focus on a near object usually by staring at
a computer screen a cell phone or really doing any near tasks throughout the day and we often
get this because of overuse of our eyes if you think of a 20 pound weight and you're gonna do
an arm curl and try to hold it here for many hours throughout the day your arms can eventually get
tired and the same thing happens with the eyes when you're focusing on something like your phone
for many hours throughout the day your eyes don't like to hold it in that position so your eyes are
gonna give up eye strain does tend to get more complicated when you factor in posture and eye
dryness so those are a couple of things that are going to be intertwined with our tips so
let's just jump into it tip number one for eye strain relief is that of taking frequent breaks
most eye doctors will in fact recite the 20 20 20 rule which means that you should take a break
every 20 minutes looking at least 20 feet away for 20 seconds that should be enough time for
your eye muscles that are both inside the eye and outside of the eye to relax and then you
can re-engage those muscles to keep focusing on your near objects and keep doing what you're doing
otherwise some people if they're focusing too long may end up with an accommodative spasm where their
eye muscles more or less cramp up and are stuck in that near focus position so again taking breaks
is important tip number two is to try not to hold things so close to your face you want to be able
to hold things further out at a comfortable distance so that you can still read and do
what you're doing otherwise i see a lot of young kids trying to hold things close to their face
and that basically encourages the convergence of your eye muscles together kind of has the
cross side appearance and that's going to add more strain to your eye muscles so again if you can try
to hold things a little bit further out from you so that you can still read and function but not
enough that you're going to really strain those eye muscles tip number three is to sit upright
with proper posture this is really important if you are using a desktop computer screen or
if you are somebody that's constantly looking at a mobile device because a lot of us end up turning
our shoulders and heads looking downward and that puts a lot of extra pressure on
the back of our neck and shoulders and that can contribute significantly to developing digital
eye strain and the combination of sore eyes neck muscles and shoulders all contribute to things
like eye strain headaches so if you are using a computer screen at a desk it isn't recommended to
try to sit upright with your ears right in alignment with your shoulders looking straight
ahead at your computer screen i personally always recommend to my patients that they should be able
to give a high five to the computer screen that's a good distance away from that screen and to keep
your eyes almost level with the center of the screen or just slightly looking downward you can
even then tilt the computer screen up a little bit so that you are perfectly just in alignment
looking straight at that screen otherwise again if you are sitting too close if you're rounding your
shoulders turning your neck down then that can all again contribute to this sense of eye strain
one recommended way to work on your phone while sitting down is to keep your spine and your neck
in alignment with your phone again in front of your eyes while you can lean forward and rest your
elbows on your legs it seems a little weird but it is supposed to be better posture for your neck
and your spine rather than sacrificing the back your neck always looking downward i'll be honest i
myself have always found posture to be a difficult thing i naturally have always been a sloucher so
this is something i've been working on a lot over the last year and a half but i have found that it
has helped a lot with my eyestrain tip number four is to use good lighting and that's because having
appropriate bright amount of light is going to help enhance contrast and boost your visual
performance it is also recommended to use a light that is a little bit on the softer side
more something on the yellow side or that specifically does not emit much blue light and
that's because if you're working on a project into the later evenings the blue light may affect your
sleep cycles and can have other neurophysiological effects that may affect our overall well-being
that way you get a bright light that maximizes your visual performance and reduces your eye
strain but doesn't necessarily affect your eyes and your sleep cycle as well tip number five is
to activate dark mode or blue light mode on your digital devices if you've never heard of dark
mode this is a special setting that you can set most of phones as well as desktop computers on so
that the background of the screen will go from a bright white light to being more of a darker gray
or black setting this should hopefully reduce the energy consumption of your digital devices as well
as give off less less blue light and give a more comfortable feeling to your eyes in addition to
dark mode most electronic devices also have a blue light dimmer function to them uh depending on the
device that you're using there's different ways to activate that but it should help reduce some
problems with blue light exposure and some studies have shown that blue light filter apps such as
these can help reduce the melatonin suppression caused by blue light exposure from a screen if
that's something you'd like to try and you're not sure how to make those setting changes on your
computer i'll put links to the video description below as well as up here on the youtube card up
above that'll go to a tutorial video that'll help you out tip number six is to manage your dry eye
symptoms whether you are on a computer screen or reading out of a book or any task that's up close
we tend not to blink as often and that leaves your eyes open to dry out and that causes these dry
eye symptoms of gritty irritated eyes so blinking more often as well as using lubricating eye drops
throughout the day or even doing warm compresses may help i do have other videos on dry eye tips
and kind of ways to treat dry eyes if you want to check out any of those videos and see the full
series i'll put links in the description below again so you can learn a little bit more otherwise
tip number seven if you are still struggling with eye strain throughout the day and you haven't had
an eye exam lately it's important to go in to see your eye doctor and ask them about what is
going on with your eyes perhaps it's something like your eye prescription for your glasses has
changed and it just needs a simple update and refraction or if you're somebody that does require
long periods of time in front of a digital device such as a computer screen maybe dedicated glasses
for computer use or reading glasses may be ideal for you again talk to your local eye doctor and
see what they can help you with hey if you enjoyed today's video and you learned something new smash
that like button for me because that's going to tell me that you like these kind of tip style
videos also if you have any other comments or questions about eye strain in general is there
anything that's really worked for you yay or nay drop those in the comment section below i'd love
to hear from you either way i appreciate you and if you want to learn more about
eye strain in general blue light glasses computer glasses figuring out which one's best for you i
have a whole video series you can click or tap the screen up over here to the side to check that out
or if you want to see another cool video from doctor eye health you can clear it up the screen
down over here thanks again so much for watching keep an eye on it and we'll talk to you soon