DINA NEWMAN
Health Columnist
I was just curling up on the couch with a good book, with my 9-month-old son finally down for his morning nap, when my vision became blurred. I waited a few seconds, thinking I might have moved too fast, and began looking for my place in the book. But I still couldn’t make out the words.
As a trained medical provider, I calmly began testing my peripheral vision. I was having tunnel vision and what I could see was extremely blurred, as if I were wearing my husband’s Coke-bottle glasses. I began to think of what life would be like if my vision didn’t return. I couldn’t care for my infant son or chase him around the house. I couldn’t do my job and diagnose sore throats and rashes. I couldn’t even cook, which is my favorite pastime.
It was a long hour before my vision cleared. Fortunately, the changes were temporary and merely heralded the coming of a migraine headache. That too would pass with time, but it brought me to realize how critical my eyes are to my daily life, and how I could be taking better care of them. I also began thinking of students who come into the Health Center with eye problems — many of them preventable.
Unfortunately, red and irritated eyes can become a mainstay of college life. One simple way to prevent this is to avoid rubbing your eyes. It’s easier said than done but critically important. Rubbing can introduce viruses and bacteria that proliferate in the tear film and produce what is commonly known as pink eye.
People often rub their eyes because they itch. Itching can be a sign of allergies, but it is treatable with medicated eye drops. Red eyes can also be caused by the physical action of rubbing, especially if you wear contact lenses, as the cornea (the eyeball) can be scratched by dirt, contact lenses or simply repetitive friction. It is possible to overuse contacts, resulting in eye pain as well as ulcers on the cornea, which can develop into a medical emergency. To prevent this, clean contacts thoroughly and alternate wearing them with glasses.
Prolonged reading or staring at a computer screen also can result in irritated eyes as well as a decline in vision.
“People whose professions entail much reading during either training or performance of the occupation (lawyers, physicians, microscopists and editors) have higher degrees of myopia (shortsightedness) and the myopia may progress not just in people’s teenage years but throughout their 20s and 30s,” said Douglas R. Fredrick, professor of ophthalmology at University of California San Francisco, in an interview with BBC.
Fredrick said it is the eyestrain of close, prolonged reading that contributes to this condition. I doubt you will be able to convince professors to reduce reading loads in favor of preserving your eyesight. Instead, get your eyes checked regularly, spread reading out over a long period of time, read with plenty of background light and taking one-minute “eye breaks” at least every 20 minutes. An eye break consists of looking around the room or off into the distance, looking up and down and to either side, and closing your eyes.
Finally, don’t forget to wear your sunglasses outdoors. UV rays can damage your eyes and result in pterygiums (horizontal growths on the whites of your eye which can block vision), cataracts (clouding of the eye) and age-related macular degeneration (damage to your retina).
As my experience illustrates, your eyes are fragile and need to be taken care of. Follow these tips in being kind to your eyes because you’ll need them for a long time.
11-10-2005
