Presbyopia causes and treatments
Presbyopia is somehow inevitable in people above 40, even if they have never suffered from any vision problem during younger ages. The most common sign of presbyopia is burry vision when doing close-up work, such as reading, sewing or computer tasks. As a result, presbyopic people always need to hold books, magazines, newspapers and other reading materials at arm’s distance. Presbyopic individuals may experience headache, eye strain or fatigue after a long period of near work. As more and more people entering old ages, presbyopic patients are increasing.
Some people may be confused by presbyopia and farsightedness, which have similar symptoms. However, presbyopia is different from farsightedness, along with nearsightedness and astigmatism. The latter three eye problems are related to irregular eyeball shapes, while presbyopia is caused by natural aging. As people age, the lens in the eye will gradually thicken and lose flexibility due to protein changes inside it. Muscle fibers around the lens will also experience some changes. As a result, the flexibility loss in the eye results in a harder time focusing up close.
For mild and moderate presbyopia, a variety of eyeglasses and contact lenses are available, all of which provide clear and comfortable close vision. Reading glasses are exclusively for close work. If you do not want a frequent switch between separate pairs of glasses, there are also other creative solutions. The lenses of bifocal eyeglasses have two different parts: the upper one for distance vision and the bottom one for close vision. Progressive additional lenses are similar, but they have multiple focal points with different powers and also remove visible lines in the lenses.
All those technologies can also be applied to contact lenses, both available in GP lenses and soft lenses. Monovision is another common technology in contact lenses. With monovision, people wear a lens with distance prescription in one eye and another lens with close prescription in the other eye.
A variety of surgical treatments are also available now. NearVision CK treatment uses radio waves to create more curvature in the cornea, so as to improve near vision. LASIK for presbyopia corrects one eye for near vision and leave the other eye with normal distance vision untreated, in order to get monovision. The implantation of presbyopia-correcting intraocular lenses during a cataract surgery can also provide clear near vision.
The injection of elastic gel into the capsule bag and laser treatments that aim at increasing the lens flexibility are under trials. Another experimental surgery named PresbyLASIK uses an excimer laser to create multiple distances of vision.
