Wearing corrective lenses of any type, be it contact lenses or glasses, can become unpleasant over time. At first, wearing reading glasses may seem fun and even fashionable for a lot of people. But once the newness wears off, they become more of a burden and one more thing to keep up with, clean, and replace. Many patients ask us if there is a way to correct their vision so they no longer need to wear reading glasses. At 43Vision, we are here to offer that hope to our patients. A life with clear reading vision can be possible without glasses or contacts. There are many treatment options available to correct vision, and the expert team at 43Vision would love to help you say goodbye to your glasses! Call our office today for additional information or to schedule an appointment and put reading vision problems in your past.
Can you get rid of reading glasses?
Small print becomes increasingly challenging to read as we age, and blurry vision can become quite bothersome. You might come to believe after a while that you have no choice but to get a couple of sets of reading glasses and be stuck with them for the rest of your life. For those who have never worn glasses before, this adjustment can be very stressful.
Until the natural lens in their eye develops a cataract and they need cataract surgery to correct their vision, many people struggle along with their readers or keep buying new pairs of glasses or bifocals. However, if you require readers at age 45 but don't develop cataracts severe enough for surgery until you are 65 or older, you will have to use readers for at least 20 years!
43Vision is proud to offer patients a procedure called Custom Lens Replacement, which is also known as Refractive Lens Exchange (RLE). It is similar to cataract surgery but is performed before cataracts have developed and treats nearsightedness (myopia), farsightedness (hyperopia), and astigmatism. In a custom lens replacement procedure, a customized artificial lens is used to replace the eye's natural lens. This flexible artificial lens enables you to focus on both close-up and distant objects and enhances visual perception.
Within a few days of the procedure, vision returns to normal as the eye heals. Over the coming weeks and months, the eyes will adjust and become even more focused as vision sharpens. The best news is the artificial lens won't develop a cataract after custom lens replacement, so you won't have to worry about returning for another procedure in the future.
Glasses-free after 43 is always our goal at 43Vision! With Custom Lens Replacement, the majority of our patients can anticipate being able to go about their typical daily activities without any glasses. The same can be expected for blended LASIK patients; however, as your natural lens continues to harden and your requirement for readers becomes more apparent, you should consider custom lens replacement. Yes, you really can get rid of reading glasses!
Does everyone eventually need reading glasses?
Whether you use prescription glasses now or not, reading glasses will most likely ultimately be necessary for you as your eye's ability to focus diminishes. Even if you never had to wear glasses while growing up, you will unavoidably require a set of reading glasses or multifocal contact lenses by the time you are in your early to mid-forties, unless you are naturally near sighted, in which case your distance vision would be blurry.
The lens inside our eyes must bend in order for us to view objects up close, such as on a computer screen, in a book, a sewing needle, or text messages on a smartphone screen. The more it can bend, the clearer the surrounding objects become to us. The lens inside of our eyes stiffens up as we get older and more mature. It can no longer flex as much as it once could, making close things appear blurrier.
When our eyes are young, our lens is flexible and malleable like an inflated balloon, enabling sharp close vision. As we grow older, the lens in our eyes begins to stiffen and become less flexible, leading to fuzzy near vision. The medical term for this natural occurrence is presbyopia. Around the age of 40, it starts to become more noticeable, and it stays with you the rest of your life.
It could be annoying at this point since things that were once clear without reading glasses or contact lenses need some more assistance. Fortunately, there are lots of options to help you get used to this completely normal process! These include:
•Glasses for reading
•Bifocal Lenses
•Progressive lenses
•Multifocal Contact Lenses
•Monovision Contact Lenses
•FDA Approved Eye Drops for Presbyopia
•Multifocal Intra-ocular Lenses
•Corneal Inlays
Researchers are working to get Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for multifocal LASIK treatments like PresbyLASIk, Supracor, and Intracor, in addition to all of these other alternatives.
At 43Vision, we specialize in using Custom Lens Replacement and Blended LASIK (laser blended vision correction) to help our presbyopic patients. Call our office today to learn more and find out how you can get rid of reading glasses for good.
Does LASIK eliminate reading glasses?
For those seeking treatment for trouble with nearsightedness or other common refractive errors of the eye, LASIK laser vision correction may be an excellent alternative. However, treating presbyopia is not its intended use. LASIK reshapes the cornea to improve vision, but presbyopia affects near vision because of changes to the eye's lens. You might still require reading glasses in your 40s or 50s, even if LASIK surgery in your 20s freed you from glasses and contacts.
To correct presbyopia, some eye specialists use a procedure called blended LASIK. A blended technique is used to correct near vision for one eye and distance vision for the other eye. Blended vision is not for everyone because it depends on the brain's capacity for adaptation, but approximately 75% of patients are able to tolerate it. Many people over 40 also experience dry eye issues, and LASIK has been known to exacerbate dry eye symptoms. There is little data on how effective this off-label LASIK use is for individuals with presbyopia, and it is not FDA authorized as a treatment for the condition.
Does LASIK speed up the need for reading glasses?
Presbyopia is the age-related decline in near vision that results in adults over 40 beginning to experience blurred vision when reading things up close. Presbyopia is not brought on by LASIK, but there are ways to use the procedure to treat it. Presbyopia is a natural part of becoming older, whether or not you've had LASIK. It happens to everyone at some point.
The natural lens of the eye, which is found inside the eye behind the pupil, stiffens with age. The lens's function is to bulge or flex to provide clear close-up vision before relaxing to provide clear distance vision. A youthful person is always looking up close and then back out to distance, flexing and then relaxing their lens. In those under the age of 40 with healthy eyes, this flexing and relaxing is an instinctive and natural action. But after the age of 40, the lens gets progressively stiffer with time until it reaches its maximum stiffness at the age of 60. For this reason, it is normal for healthy eyes to begin noticing a gradual loss of close vision beyond the age of 40, as well as a gradual increase in the requirement for reading glasses.
This process does not result from LASIK. In actuality, LASIK surgery is carried out on the cornea—the eye's outer surface and does not involve touching the lens. If you'd like to know more about freedom from glasses, call 43Vision to schedule an appointment and let our team of doctors help you determine which procedure is right for you.
Can I wear contacts instead of reading glasses?
Are contacts available for reading? Yes! Instead of carrying reading glasses with them wherever they go and keeping a pair in the car, desk, purse, or pocket, many people choose to wear contact lenses to solve this issue. Presbyopia can be corrected in a variety of ways, including contact lenses that feature bifocals—a form of multifocal lens—which are intended for those who struggle to focus on close-up objects due to presbyopia.
Multifocal contacts have lens powers that complement vision at close, moderate, and far distances. They are contact lenses with several prescription strengths to treat for conditions like presbyopia. You can wear multifocal lenses even if you only require reading glasses because they have numerous power prescriptions, and the distance prescription can range from 0 to gradually rising power.
While you can wear contact lenses or even just one contact lens to help with reading vision, most people find this to be a hassle and look to 43Vision for a more permanent solution for their vision problems. In addition, the quality of the optics of a multifocal lens implants is higher than the quality of the optic of a contact lens. Call our office to find out how Custom Lens Replacement can give you the freedom from contact lenses and glasses today.
Get Rid of Glasses with 43Vision
Patients who are normally over 40 with refractive errors (nearsightedness or far-sightedness) and presbyopia (aging eyes) make good candidates for Custom Lens Replacement. If you are ready to say goodbye to eyeglasses or contacts that you've needed for distant vision correction as well as reading correction, haven't yet developed cataracts, and maybe been told that LASIK wasn't the greatest option to achieve your visual goals, then Custom Lens Replacement may be right for you.
Visit our staff at 43Vision if you are tired of dealing with readers and want clear vision for life. We might have the ideal approach for you to have the eyesight you've dreamed about!
