Understanding Vision Problems -- Treatment
How Are Vision Problems Identified?
Periodic comprehensive eye exams by your eye doctor are essential to monitor the health of your eyes and diagnose suspected problems. Checking the position of each eye and its movements will reveal crossed eyes or other forms of strabismus. The exam may include these parts:
- An eye chart uses letters of decreasing size to determine the sharpness of your vision at a distance.
- The retinoscope projects a thin beam of light into the eye. When used with the rotating lens dial (called the phoropter) the eye doctor measures any refractive error like nearsightedness, farsightedness, or astigmatism.
- A slit-lamp microscope exam of the surface of each eye. The same device is used to inspect the eye's internal structures. This is how changes in the clear cornea and lens are identified.
Pressure inside the eye is measured using one of several devices.
Understanding Black Eye -- Treatment
To treat a black eye, begin with ice or a cloth immersed in icy water and wrung out. Applying something cold to a black eye works in two ways: It helps to reduce swelling and it constricts blood vessels, which in turn stops the bleeding below the skin. Make a crushed ice pack or grab a package of frozen vegetables and apply the compress to the affected area for 10 minutes at a time (10 minutes off) to prevent damage to the skin around your eye from the ice. Besides icy treatment, there's not much...
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- Exams with an ophthalmoscope can reveal abnormalities of the retina, the macula, the optic nerve, and other structure inside the eye.
- Dilating eye drops may be given in order for the doctor to complete a full exam. The purpose of dilation is to open the pupil or “window” to allow a much better view of the lens, retina, and optic nerve. Although this can cause some temporary blurriness, it is a very important evaluation. Typically, sunglasses are given at the end of an examination to help protect the eyes from sensitivity after the dilation until the effect wears off.
What Are the Treatments for Vision Problems?
If routine testing indicates that you have a refractive error, conventional treatment calls for wearing corrective glasses or contact lenses. Almost 60% of the population wears corrective lenses, and that number increases markedly after the age of 65. In many cases, surgical correction of refractive errors is possible using modern surgical techniques such as LASIK.
Conventional treatment for disorders such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism typically relies on corrective prescription lenses. Disorders such as cataracts, glaucoma, macular degeneration, and retinal detachment require advanced medical and surgical treatments. Enormous progress in eye surgery has been made over the past few decades. Many people with eye problems previously felt to be untreatable now enjoy improved eyesight and an improved quality of life. This applies to individuals of every age -- infants to senior citizens!
To treat nearsightedness, your eye doctor will usually prescribe lenses to focus visual images correctly on the retina. Depending on the specifics of your eye exam, you may have a choice between wearing conventional eyeglasses and contact lenses.
As an alternative to corrective lenses, surgery can be performed to treat nearsightedness. Radial keratotomy (RK) was a common treatment of nearsightedness from the mid 1980’s to mid 1990’s. It has practically been replaced with safer and more precise laser vision correction techniques. Though not used anymore, RK was a surgical procedure in which tiny, spoke-like incisions were made in the cornea, flattening the center in order to focuse images correctly on the retina. The surgery was performed on one eye at a time and the success rate was good. More than three-quarters of those who had the surgery reported being fully corrected or close to it. The procedure was not without potential complications, however. Vision often fluctuated, the cornea could become infected, and there was some ongoing risk of the corneal rupture from minor trauma. Other common long-term problems have been glare from incisions very close to the center of vision and instability of vision over the years.
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