so what is the best two week contact lens also known as a bi-weekly
contact lens in this video we're going to take a look at and review the Acuvue family
of contacts specifically the Acuvue oasis contact lens going over the pros and the cons
of the number one selling contact lens in the world that's today's video let's take a look
what's up welcome back this is dr Allen here from the dr eye health show helping you learn all about
the eyes vision buying the best vision products on this channel we do a lot of education around eye
diseases other treatments but also product reviews around things like contact lenses and glasses all
those cool things that we love so if you're new here to the channel and like learning about the
eyes seeing your best hit the subscribe button down below so you don't miss any of our future
videos now i'm pretty excited to talk to you today about the activity oasis contact lenses
this happens to be a requested video for quite some time in fact these lenses have been out for a
long time since about 2005 to be exact and is one of the first contact lenses i wore personally as a
teenager and i'll tell you and give you a heads up for myself and many other eye doctors i know
we have a very much a love-hate relationship with these lenses and just as you guys know me i'm
going to be getting into that now the full name of this product is Acuvue oasis with hydroclear
plus this is a technology of a moisturizer that is built into the lens to keep the lens stable
and comfortable while you're wearing it and that's specifically a technology that johnson and johnson
who own the Acuvue lenses they have always done a really good job for all of the different lenses in
their lens families of having these different moisturizers that improve the overall comfort
and performance of their lenses and no doubt the massive success of these lenses is attributed to
their comfort that they offer people namely coming from two things both the hydroclear technology
that they have but then also the edge design of the lenses which is shared across many of the
lens families from johnson & johnson specifically in the Acuvue family this different edge design
really reduces the wetting angle of the lens which helps improve the weldability and reduce any sort
of eyelid interaction with the edges of the lenses again improving comfort now Acuvue oasis lenses do
come in a wide variety of powers going everywhere from a plus 8 diopter of power all the way down to
a negative 12 diopter of power and they're also available in astigmatism correction a lot of
people always ask me that if something's available for astigmatism and yes Acuvue oasis is available
for astigmatism correction plus they also come in a single-use one-day lens family and
they also have multi-focal or multifocal lenses for presbyopia in fact they have two different
multifocals two different designs uh that's a whole other topic and we'll get into that in
another video in addition the lenses also contain one of the highest uv blocking technologies for
contact lens blocking out 99 of all uv light they could possibly pass through that lens into the eye
and the lenses also have a cool handling tint just to make them a little bit blue so you can see if
they drop them on the counter and another one is that they have the numbers one two three written
on the lenses in case they happen to be inside out then you can hold them up and look for the little
one two three assuming that you have clear enough vision to see up close but as the name of this
video implies the original activity oasis lens and the Acuvue oasis for astigmatism are a two
two-week contact lens also known as a bi-weekly contact lens and again doctors like myself have
a bit of a love-hate relationship with them now we love them because they are so comfortable and
they work for so many of our patients they even come at least in the standard original
spherical ones come in different base curves such as an 8.4 base curve and an 8.8 meaning that they
fit better for people with really steep corneas as well as people with really flat corneas and they
are some of the more affordable contact lenses on the market being that they've been out for some
time the price wise they're around 63 us dollars for a 12 pack of these lenses again they're a two
week lens so if you're wearing it for both eyes for a full year supply it only comes out to around
the 250 us dollar range but again you can always shop around for contacts ask your local eye clinic
for rebates or discounts all those things but again the issue i have with these lenses and i'm
guilty of this too when i was in high school and wearing these lenses i did this exact same thing
but most people i find who wear them over wear these lenses and i think there's a couple of
different reasons that this can happen one and i've seen this a lot of people think that they're
not a two-week lens or a bi-weekly lens they think they are a monthly lens so they wear them
for a full month another possible reason is that two-week lens replacement is just kind of an odd
time because we do everything in like months right so it might be just odd for them and they miss it
we're all human we make mistakes or it could be that people are purposely over wearing them
trying to extend the life out of their contacts so they don't have to buy as many
and i can totally understand that too but as you've probably heard me say in other videos
over wearing and extending your contact lenses and especially sleeping in lenses
dramatically increases your risk for not only infections and ulcers but other complications
on the surface of the eye with contacts so as a healthcare provider you can see why i'm always
a bit concerned and nervous when i hear somebody is wearing these lenses for not just a month
but maybe six weeks or maybe two months or more and this may be purely anecdotal but i'm pretty
sure that the vast majority of people i've seen with infections or complications from contact
lens wear have come from them wearing these lenses not because it's the Acuvue oasis lens the lens is
great it's just the fact that so many people do over wear them and abuse them and i think it is
largely just because a two-week replacement is such an odd thing and i think that's why so many
other brands are moving away from a two-week replacement they're either doing monthlies
or they're doing single use daily contact lenses because it's just way healthier and we don't
want to see anybody go blind now one other cool thing about activity oasis especially for me as
a provider is that these lenses are approved as a bandage contact lens so people who have gotten a
scrape on the eye or post-surgical cases will place these lenses on the eye as a bandage to
protect the cornea from other problems and that's because it's been approved as a bandage lens
by the US FDA as a class iii medical device which means that it has a high oxygen transmissibility
of about 147 dk over t which means a lot of oxygen gets to the cornea which allows for you
to sleep in these lenses up to six nights of extended wear now again i know i've said that
your chance of infection goes up dramatically when you're sleeping in lenses but sometimes that's a
chance your doctor has to take before you go ahead and sleep in these lenses uh make sure that you do
talk to your doctor that they have approved you for that and that your eyes can handle it because
not everybody's eyes can really handle a lens like this even with that higher oxygen transmissibility
but again overall i do find these lenses to be excellent they come in a lot of different powers
a lot of patients love them because they're comfortable the biggest downside again is just
that a lot of people over wear them and abuse them and it i just see a lot of problems because of
that so thankfully they've started moving towards single-use daily contact lenses and other options
but i encourage you to let me know your experience do you wear the activity oasis lenses have you
tried them are they comfortable and if you happen to work in an eye clinic are you like me where
you tend to see a lot of problems from people who wear the specific lens usually because of
overwear what are your thoughts love to know either way thank you so much for watching if
you want to learn more about the active oasis lenses including seeing updated prices i'll
put links in the video description below so you can find that easily if you did enjoy this video
help us out by smashing the like button because that's going to help us out or if you just want to
learn other cool information about contacts check out our full series by clicking or tap the screen
up here to the side thanks again for watching keep an eye on it and we'll talk to you soon