Hi everyone, I’m Dr Pricilla and I’m an optometrist. You might have noticed that if
you go into an optical practice and you want to purchase contact lenses they will ask for
your contact lens prescription. Having a glasses prescription doesn’t automatically qualify
you to get contact lenses because these are two completely different things. You need
to specifically have a contact lens test with your eye doctor first. You might be wondering why
this is the case. And it’s not because we want to make life harder for you.
Contact lenses are a medical device that needs to be fitted properly on your eyes. And there
isn’t a one size fits all option because contacts and eyes come in different shapes
and sizes. There are also different materials of contacts. It’s like if you tried on the
same size pants from 2 different brands, they won’t fit the same. One may fit perfectly
while the other may be too tight on the hips but fits well on the legs or it can just fit
totally wrong. It’s not just the clothing but even 2 people who wear the same clothing
size will come in different body shapes and proportions. What’s easy with pants is that
you can actually see if it fits well in the mirror, but with contacts you need your eye
doctor to check that. Overall, we don’t want your contacts fitting
too tightly or too loose. If it fits too tight it prevents oxygen from getting to your eyes
and can cause problems to your eyes like neovascularization. This is when you get new blood vessels forming
on the cornea, the front surface of the eyes, where there shouldn’t be any blood vessels, you can also
get corneal ulcers which can potentially lead to blindness. If contact lenses are too loose
that’s not good either as it causes discomfort cause you can feel the movement and it can cause
variable vision when you blink or the contact lens can actually even fall out of your eyes.
So we need it juuuust right, whether it’s for prescription contacts, non-prescription
contacts or coloured contact lenses. Cause you might not feel the difference on your
eyes. There are also different contact lens materials.
Back to the pants analogy, pants can come in: cotton, cotton blend, synthetic, silk,
linen and so on. With contact lenses, some materials are more breathable or have
newer technology that is healthier for your eyes.
In order to get the best vision in your contacts, the power in it must also be checked. The
contact lens power may not exactly be the same as your glasses. This is because contacts
are a device that sits directly on the eye rather than 1cm away from the eyes like your
glasses. This distance may be small but it affects the power required to focus light
in your eyes properly to get clear vision. So when you go see your eye doctor, they will
prescribe you with lenses that are a healthy and compatible material with your eyes that
fit right as well as adjusting your script power to give you your best optimal vision.
So why do you need your contact lens prescription updated regularly? Can’t you just use the
same one? Contact lenses are a medical device as I mentioned and therefore
requires an up to date prescription, which can only be prescribed by your eye doctor.
The eye test isn’t just to see if your prescription has changed but also to ensure your eyes are
healthy to continue with your lenses and to screen for contact lens related issues as
well as other eye diseases like glaucoma and macular degeneration. Because our bodies and
our eyes are continually changing, it means that one type of contact lens may not work
for you for life, and if you’ve never had any complications with your lenses in the
past it doesn’t exempt you from issues in the future. In the end, we want to prevent
contact lens complications from happening rather than waiting for it to happen
and try and fix it. What if your optometrist doesn’t carry the
lens you want to use? If you have a certain brand of contact lenses
you want to try and your optometrist doesn’t stock it, there might be a reason for that.
In Australia, optometrists will only prescribe TGA approved contact lenses.
Some online brands may not be TGA approved and may contain harmful chemicals, and it
is common they use older technology material that do not allow your eyes to breathe which
will cause long term issues with a lack of oxygen reaching the eye, also known as hypoxia.
You may have heard horror stories of people getting severe infections or have gone blind
from wearing certain halloween lenses.
Talk to your eye doctor and see what their thoughts are on the brand that you’re interested
in. If they are happy with the material and manufacturer they might be able to assess
the fit of the lenses for you. Where should you purchase your contacts?
After you get your prescription, where you purchase your contacts is also something to
consider. I would advise not to purchase your contacts
from a non-reputable place. Places that you may want to stay away from are costume shops
or small kiosks, beauty shops with coloured lenses or places online you can order without
a prescription. There are certain sites that send you contact
lenses without verifying your prescription from your optometrist. Although this may sound convenient
for you, but it doesn’t seem like these places are putting your health first and they may
be putting your eye health in jeopardy. So how often should you get you contact lens prescription
checked? How often you need to do this will depend
on what type of contact lens you’re wearing, your eye health history and track record of
infections. Generally speaking scripts may be valid for 1-2 years.
Now you understand why you need a contact lens prescription and a routine eye test to
update them. Trust me, it’s not because we’re trying to make life difficult for
you. We just want the best for your eyes. If you found this video helpful hit the like
button and subscribe and click the notification bell so you don’t miss any of our new videos
answering your common eye questions. Thanks for watching.