Prism In Glasses

[Captin Kirk]

I am now 42 years old and have never had any problems with my eyesight or required glasses. However over the last 6 to 12 months I have started to feel as if my eyes take a little longer to focus on things and I seem to have a few more headaches than I ever used to.

At first I put it down to tension from work and tiredness spending too many late nights on answerbank and the rest. I have tried to have a few more early nights and chill out a bit more at work and the headaches are less frequent but the eyesight issue is the same.

I have had an eye test today at an opticians and been told I have better than 20/20 vision in both eyes and no signs of gluacoma or diabetes. What he has identified and said is the reason for the problem is my eyes do not work in conjuction with each other and the muscles are straining. The vertical line test showed they look at an image in a different position hence the delay in focusing on objects.

He has made a prescription for glasses with a prism in the lenses. He wants me to wear them for 3 months and come back for another examination to see how I am getting on. The glasses are to be worn continuously for the first week and then when I feel I need them (driving, computer, reading etc.) or when my eyes are tired.

He suggests that this may be enough to "re-train" the muscles and further use of the glasses will not be required or only if needed in the future. Surgery was also mentioned briefly but was not discussed in depth as he wants to wait and see if the glasses help.

After getting over the shock of now being "boss-eyed", (not through years of self-abuse I might add!) and needing specs I would just like to know if anyone else on here has had this problem and the outcome.

p.s.think I'll have a lie down ... I never write posts this long :-)

[york310]

Needing prismatic correction in spectacles is a common issue. It seems more of a problem because obviously you have good vision and it seems strange to need glasses to correct this muscle balance issue.

The muscles that control your eyes can become weaker with age and this can couse these problems. Whenever you look at a target your muscles which control your eye movement have to work to allow your eyes to fixate on the target together. Sometimes your muscles can be a little bit weak and find it had to maintain this work.

If these problems happen more when you do close work this could be due to a 'convergence insufficiency' and sometimes people are given exercises such as 'pen to nose' to try to help these muscles work harder. The problem with doing these exercises is that they can cause the symptoms you have as they are doing the work that you feel is a problem. These are best carried out before going to bed I find.

If these are difficult to do or you still have problems then the prism in the glasses helps you control the muscles but personally I would recommend you use them only when doing the tasks you have found to aggrevate the problem. Some people may say they help retrain your eyes to do the work others may say your eyes become dependant on the help.

Surgery would not be a good option if there is no big problem to solve.

I hope this helps.

[york310]

I forgot to add that it is also possible that this could also just be that you could also just be experiencing the early effects of presbyopia.