Contact Lenses

Contact lenses are a type of small, thin lens that is placed directly on the surface of your eye. The lens is worn on the cornea or on the surface of the white part of your eye. The contact lenses are used to correct vision.

Before inserting your contact lenses

• Keep a small mirror, washed lint free towel, a clean bowl, washed and dry contact lens case, multipurpose lens solution and your soft contact lenses ready.

• Better to have your nails trimmed. Wash your hands with baby soap under running water. Air dry your hands; avoid wiping your hands either with a towel or tissue.

History of the Contact lens

Leonardo da Vinci had proposed the idea of applying a corrective lens directly to the surface of the eye as early as 1508 and similar concepts surfaced from René Descartes in 1636 but it was not until 1887 that the German physiologist Adolf Eugen Fick constructed the first successful contact lens.

People wear contact lenses for various reasons

If you are considering corneal refractive surgery, you must:

Contact lenses typically provide better vision than spectacles for some visual conditions such as severe short-sightedness [myopia], long-sightedness [hyperopia], astigmatism, corneal distortion, or after cataract removal [aphakia].
Some people like the wider field of vision provided by contact lenses as side vision [peripheral vision] is often blocked, obscured or limited by spectacle frames.
Contact lenses do not fog up with changes in temperature or from perspiration and they are unaffected by water or rain.
Many people choose contact lenses for personal or cosmetic reasons because they think glasses make them look less attractive or they find the weight of spectacles on their face annoying.
Sports players and people involved in vigorous activities often find contact lenses more convenient than spectacles, especially for water sports and contact sports.
Priests, psychologists and many others also find that contact lenses avoid the barrier effect that spectacles may cause, thus leading to more direct eye-contact.