Blog posts of '2015' 'August'

As an extremely sensitive organ to surrounding environment, the eye and its health risk to be in danger at the beginning of summer, because of increasing of light. Indeed, over the years, the quality of light we detect is impressively worsened due to low filtering activity of atmosphere of damaging rays, due to pollution.

A comforting news in a moment in which our eyes health is under attack in all year time, by various stress sources. One for all: the blue light emanated by digital screens. As we are used to say: 'eyes are a mirror of our soul “ in this case, “ eyes are a mirror of health state of our body “. They give us signs that are often under evaluated or for which we postpone the possible solutions to restore their wealth. As the skin of our body, they absorb everything that surrounds them.

For this reason it is fundamental to take all the precautions to make this happen. By the way, above all in summertime, 3 are the keywords to keep a good level of health of our eyes: protect, calm and empower.

Protect. Sunglasses, but only high quality 
It is necessary to find a solution to a fundamental atmosphere activity that is missing: filter the dangerous rays. So, sunglasses help us by giving the correct protective action that we need. There is the need of choosing them in correct way, depending on sight problems, neglecting the illusion of an immediate economic advantage, buying fake sunglasses at market stands, with lenses free of warranty and reliability. It is better to not have them, than to observe side effects in long period time. Besides to quality factor, we do not have to under evaluate their correct use. In general, it would be useful to put them on in days in which light is very strong and to take them out in closed environments  with artificial light. Avoid to make our pupilar reflex lazy. Our eyes are naturally adapted to different light intensity, so, do not risk of making them lazy and passive.

Calm. Allergy and irritation with hydration.
Spring time and period just before summertime can cause optical stress to our eyes through redness caused by pollen or by direct light beams. A drop per day of eyewash or whatever lubricant that can bring the right dose of liquid requested by our eye, helps to relieve the problem, by calming the redness. Avoid do-it-yourself treatments, but carefully follow opticians or ophthalmologist ’ s suggestions.

Empower. A good vision makes better sight.
Through common expedients it is possible to prevent (and in some cases to cure) bothering sight disorders  or even to improve the health status of our eyes.

In general, to divert attention from a focus point next to our sight in favor of a look in long distance, helps our eye to relax and reduce doses of eye weariness, but this seems to be not enough.
However less credible it may seem, to observe 10 minutes per day a landscape over the horizon green and flowery, it is not only improving our psycho-physical wealth but it guarantees also a correct wealth status of our eyes.

Observing natural landscapes enliven retina by cleaning it from harmful stimulus that submit visual receptors to stress. For this reason, above all for children, it is recommended to spend part of the day in outside activities.

Thanks to devices as smartphones, tablets, laptops and TVs, we do business, we learn and relax, from early morning until late night. Research has shown that more than a third of adults spends 4 to 6 hours a day with digital devices, while 14% even 10-12 hours a day (results VisionWatch - The Vision Council http://bit.ly/1yjoe7T).

There is a downside, however: all these hours spent on digital screens put a strain on the eyes and their health.

We use them at short distance, and our eyes are constantly forced to move from images, illustrations, to texts, also at high speed. This generates many troubles.

Most of digital devices in fact, emanate blue light, also known as light visible at high energy.

Even if blue light is a natural phenomenon, it is present, for example, in daylight and it helps us to be awake; but overexposure can cause eye weariness, sight disorders and insomnia.

When the blue light hits the crystalline, it refracts and forces the eye to a continuous focusing .To correct this problem people compensate by winking, with consequent visual stress.

The most frequent complaints and their causes are:

• Redness and eye irritation: happens because we stare at backlit screens for long time period
• Eye dryness: due to less lubrication, due to less “ eyelashes bat ”
• Weariness: due to excessive blue light exposure and to effort in seeing small characters and images
• Dim vision: due to screen brightness
• Pain to back, neck, and shoulders : due to incorrect posture and irregular position of monitor
• Insomnia: caused by overexposure to light blue
• Headache: due to excessive eye weariness

It is important to prevent these complaints and maintain healthy eyes, through:

• Exact distance between eyes and screen: keep the computer and portable devices just under eye level so that vision angle will not be over 35 degrees
• Dazzling reduction: regulate  screen brightness and prefer feeble settings in favor of bright white, to keep a weak environmental enlightenment  , avoiding that daylight reflects on screen; clean the screen frequently to avoid reflexes
• Correction of personal habits :avoid to fix the screen for too much , so that ayes will not dry, bat more frequently eyelashes to focus, make regular pauses and look away from the screen at least for 20 seconds every 20 minutes.
• Use of relevant eyeglasses: choose antiglare treatment, that reduce dazzling of lights present in office and external lighting, so to improve contrast and relax the eye.
• Consider a special treatment that protects from effects of blue light, that are damaging, emanated by digital screens.

BlueControl by Hoya (http://bit.ly/11p8uFa) allows our eyes to work at better conditions, offering a more relaxing and comfortable vision and a natural perception of colors, because it lessens eye weariness and improves the contrast.

For more serious problems it is necessary to consult a specialist, to get into the habit of consulting the ophthalmologist at least once per year.

Source: Economic Times