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Fitting Contact Lenses

The Importance of Fitting Contact Lenses

Most people don’t realize the importance of properly fitting contact lenses. As the name suggests, the whole point of contact lenses is for them to contact your eyes—which brings some inherent risks compared to standard glasses.

 

Symptoms of Ill-Fitting Contacts

If your contacts don’t fit properly you could experience a wide range of symptoms. For starters, you might notice the lens becoming increasingly uncomfortable the longer you wear it. Another common side-effect is the feeling of something foreign in your eye, or as if your eye has a scratch. Of course, stinging, burning, itching, irritation and other eye pain are symptomatic of an ill-fitting contact; as can be reduced visual acuity, such as blurriness, rainbows or halos around objects.

Other symptoms include excessive tearing of the eyes, unusual eye secretions, redness, dryness and sensitivity to light. As you can see it’s a vast list of symptoms, and many of them could be caused by something else, like seasonal allergies for example. Still, if you experience any of these symptoms regularly, it’s possible your contact lenses aren’t fitting you properly and a visit to your eye doctor—or LASIK MD—could be beneficial.

 

Why Fit is so Important

When fitting you for a contact lens, an optometrist will take several tests to determine the right amount of curve, thickness and diameter for your specific vision needs. The eye doctor will then place the lens in the eye to make sure it provides the desired fit. If everything is good to go, they’ll go over proper care instructions for the contacts, including cleaning, storing and handling of the lenses.

It’s funny that if you told someone to buy a pair of running shoes online, most people would retort “I have to try them on first.”  Interestingly contact lenses don’t have the same reputation, with thousands of people taking to online sites to buy contact lenses without a proper prescription. Despite the fact that contacts are something many people wear every single day, they don’t realize that if they’re not fitted well they can cause serious harm to your overall eye health.

 

The Risk of Contact Lens Intolerance

If you wear poorly fitted contact lenses for too long, there’s a good chance you’ll develop contact lens intolerance. This condition is an umbrella term for people who are no longer able to apply a lens to their eyes without pain. Contact lens intolerance can develop to the point where someone isn’t able to wear contacts for more than a few minutes, and is therefore forced to wear eyeglasses or undergo laser vision correction.

If you suspect you may have contact lenses that don’t fit you properly, there are two things you can do. The first would be to visit your eye doctor to get a proper fitting. The second would be to visit a laser vision correction provider to find out if you’re a candidate for LASIK. This method would correct your blurry vision without the need for glasses or contacts.

So if you’re interested in completely getting out of contacts, take a visit to your nearest LASIK MD clinic for a free consultation.

 

Do you have a question about LASIK? Ask one of our experts!