Nearsightedness, which is medically known as myopia, is a refractive error that occurs in 30-40% of adults in the United States. These numbers are on the rise, and experts predict that by the year 2050, half of the world’s population will have issues with nearsightedness.
At Vision and Ortho-K Center, Dr. Curtis Frank and our team specialize in refractive errors, and we offer a wide range of solutions that help our patients to see more clearly. If you’re struggling with seeing things at a distance, let’s explore how we can remedy the problem.
Nearsightedness is what we refer to as a refractive error, and to understand what this means, it’s helpful to step back and take a quick look at how your eyes work.
When light passes through your eye, it’s refracted (bent) by the various layers, including your cornea and your lens, so that the light is focused onto the center of your retina. Once your retina receives the focused light, it transmits the information to your brain via your optic nerve, where an image is formed.
With myopia, an error occurs in how the light is refracted, and the light falls short of your retina, which affects your ability to see things at a distance.
As we mentioned, there are several ways we can go about correcting your nearsightedness, starting with corrective lenses. Whether you opt for glasses or contact lenses, our goal is to help your eyes focus the light directly onto your retina so that your resulting vision is clear.
To determine the degree of focusing correction that you need, we perform a diagnostic eye exam, including a refraction assessment. Using specialized equipment, we can determine the degree of your myopia and what strength lenses will serve you best.
The next step then falls to you to decide whether you’d like contact lenses or glasses, both of which we offer here at our practice.
We also offer an innovative solution called Ortho-K lenses, which are rigid gas-permeable lenses that you wear at night to reshape your corneas. Our own Dr. Frank is a leader in orthokeratology, and he uses this technique to help slow the progression of nearsightedness in children and to improve myopia in adults.
Ultimately, Ortho-K lenses perfectly bridge the gap between daily lens wear and more aggressive solutions like surgery.
If you’d prefer not to deal with glasses or contact lenses, you may want to opt for a LASIK procedure. Since it was first approved by the FDA in 1999, more than 10 million people have undergone LASIK surgery, which enjoys an extremely high success rate of 96%.
With LASIK, which stands for laser-assisted in-situ keratomileusis, the surgeon uses laser technology to reshape your cornea, which allows your eyes to better focus light onto your retina.
While we don’t perform LASIK at our practice, we offer LASIK surgery co-management, which means we provide consultation services, as well as preoperative and postop care.
If you’d like to explore your treatment options for nearsightedness further, please contact our office in Boston, Massachusetts, to set up an appointment.
