Spending time outdoors on a beautiful and sunny Gainesville day can be enjoyable, but without sunglasses it can be dangerous to your eye health. The right sunglasses can protect your eyes, and help reduce glare and brightness, both of which can cause discomfort. 

While most sunglasses are strong enough to protect your eyes, there are many options and people sometimes have a hard time picking the right ones. Here are some tips to help you choose the right pair of sunglasses for your favorite outdoor activity.

If you enjoy fishing, you want to make sure to protect your eyes from hooks and sinkers. Fishing sunglasses should be wraparound if possible and the lenses made of sturdy polycarbonate or trivex.

Fishing is the most common outdoor activity that relates to eye injuries. About 38% of fishing eye injuries involve getting a hook caught in the eye – 44% come from getting hit in the eye by a sinker or lure.

Regular sunglasses do not provide enough protection. Instead, try to find a pair of sunglasses specifically designed for fishing. These lenses usually have a brown tint and provide better coverage for your eyes.

If you are cycling, kayaking or hiking, protecting your eyes from glare and ultraviolet rays is the most important thing you’ll want to take into consideration.

Always choose sunglasses with 100% UV protection. While a pair of glasses may look fashionable, it’s likely that they do little protect to your eyes from the sun. So it may be best to choose function over fashion.

Lens colors make a difference

Gray or green colored lenses are a good choice for runners, cyclists and golfers. These lenses help your eyes see true color, and allow you to better appreciate your surroundings, the way they were meant to be seen.

Amber or brown lenses are great for cloudy days. Both colors enhance the contrast in your vision. Brown lenses are wonderful for boating, fishing and skiing. Amber lenses, though they distort colors, reduce eye strain, and are thus better suited for pilots, hunters, skiers and others engaged in all-day outdoor activities.

Yellow lenses are effective in low-light environments, especially on those partly cloudy days, when the sun isn't strong but the day is still bright. Yellow lenses are also a great choice for skiing.

Use sunglasses with red lenses if you need an optimal contrast between objects and green or blue backgrounds. Red lenses are useful when sailing, boating, hiking and hunting.

Should I consider polarization?

Most people may not be familiar with polarization. It allows sunglass lenses to absorb light from angles, and is optimal for blocking glare. Definitely pay attention to the availability of a polarized filter when purchasing the right pair of sunglasses.

Try them on before you buy

Choose a pair of glasses that sit high on your nose. This will allow you to easily keep the lenses close to your eyes, and block light from the sides.

The sunglasses should fit your face well. If they have a nose pad, make sure the pad fits your nose properly. If they don’t have one, the sunglasses should fit the bridge of your nose snugly, but not tightly.

The most important thing is comfort, so keep trying them on until you find the pair that is just right.

If you are unsure which sunglasses may be right for you, come on in! Our optical department will be able to assist you and find the pair that suits all of your needs.

With January 1st fast approaching, many of us think about New Year’s resolutions. Typical ones like resolving to lose five-to-10 pounds, read more or travel the country are all great additions to your resolutions list. This year, however, we have another resolution you should consider…making an appointment for your annual eye exam.

Your eyes are important and fragile parts of your body. If you don’t take good care of them, you’ll have a harder time seeing the world. It’s important to have a comprehensive eye exam every year to keep your eyes in good health. In addition, this is a chance for your eye doctor to see if you’re at risk for developing any eye diseases or vision degradation. It’s best to maintain and prevent any diseases; if found, before they get out of hand. Routine yearly eye exams help achieve this and it should be a part of everyone’s New Year’s resolution.

What Is the Doctor Examining?                       

Your eye doctor will do an initial sight measurement to determine your overall visual health. This primarily looks at “refractive error” which is classified into three vision impairments:

• Myopic or nearsightedness – difficulty seeing objects in the distance.
• Hyperopia or farsightedness – difficult seeing objects up close.
• Astigmatism – Blurred vision due to irregular formation of your eye’s lens or cornea.

Usually, these 3 vision impairments are corrected by prescription glasses or contacts. While having those items will give you a clear picture, it’s recommended to maintain your yearly exams to ensure your vision isn’t getting worse.

Added to the sight measurement, eye physicians test if you’re at risk for certain eye diseases. Most of the time, catching these diseases early and treating them right away will alleviate any risk of vision loss.

Don’t put of this exam until it’s too late. It only takes a few minutes and you’ll be out the door happy you got your eyes examined.

At Gainesville Eye Physicians and Optical we are committed to delivering the highest quality of healthcare. That’s why we hire licensed opticians to treat patients in our optical department. Not every optical shop can claim that. In fact, most retail eyeglass outlets don’t employ licensed opticians. So, why is that important for your eye health?

Let’s begin with a definition. An optician is someone who interprets the prescriptions created by ophthalmologists or optometrists to produce contact lenses or eyeglasses. They often use a series of tests and technologies to determine how a patient can best benefit from the lenses and frames they select. These evaluations take into consideration both vision needs and lifestyle preferences.

Accurately translating the physician’s prescription into a set of lenses that address your vision needs is, of course, a critical step. It’s not uncommon for a patient to complain that an eye doctor inaccurately diagnosed their condition, when the breakdown actually occurred in the creation of the lenses.

Becoming a licensed optician requires a great deal of education, apprenticeship and testing. The State of Florida requires an optician to apprentice for 6250 hours before they can take the necessary tests to be licensed, some of these hours can be accounted for through a formal post-secondary educational program. Following this training, they take multiple board examinations to ensure their expertise.

Many retail optical shops put responsibility for your lenses in the hands of lesser-trained individuals. In fact, they may have no formal training beyond the company’s in-house instruction. This can result in glasses that fail to correct your vision problems and may even make them worse.

Gainesville Eye Physicians and Optical is blessed to have two of the best trained and best liked opticians in all of Florida, Mindy Tillman and Fagan Arouh, and they are both licensed. That means their education and skills surpass many others in our area.

When selecting someone to fill your eyeglass or contact lens prescription, remember to ask if he or she is a licensed optician. At Gainesville Eye Physicians and Optical, the answer will be yes.

If you find yourself in one of these careers you’ll want to ask your employer to assess the work environment for eye safety. The employer can remove or reduce eye hazards where possible, and provide appropriate safety eyewear as well as require workers to use it.

You need to make sure you are using proper glasses, goggles, face shields or helmets specifically designed for your task. It’s the easiest and most effective way to keep your eyes safe.

If needed, your ophthalmologist or eyecare provider can assist your employer in determining potential eye hazards and evaluating the need for eye protection.

Do you work in an office job, and believe your eyes are pretty safe from hazards? Not so fast.

Office jobs where at least six hours per day is spent looking at some form of digital screen put eyes at risk as well. We subject ourselves to what is called digital eye strain.

We’re all familiar with the symptoms of digital eye strain:

• Eye redness or irritation
• Blurred vision
• Dry eyes
• General fatigue
• Back pain
• Neck pain
• Headaches

Fortunately these too can be avoided, or at least lessened. Increasing the font size on your screen, setting up an “eye-gonomically” friendly work station or even using computer eyewear can all dramatically reduce the effects of digital eye strain.

A report from The Vision Council provides tips for preventing digital eye strain by adjusting both internal and external factors while at the workplace.

External Factors:

• Reduce glare – Adjust the brightness of your screen to match the appropriate light level. Wiping down your screen with a clean cloth every so often can also help reduce glare.

• Make sure lights around you are dim – If your screen isn’t competing for brightness with overhead or surrounding lights, your eyes will be less strained. 

• Distance is healthy – Keep enough space between your eyes and the screen. For best practice, you should be far enough away where you can extend your arm and comfortably high-five the screen with your palm; if you can’t fully extend your arm, you’re too close to the monitor.

Internal Factors:

• Blink, blink, blink – In addition to keeping your eyes moist throughout the day – staring at a screen can really dry them out – blinking helps your eyes refocus every so often.

• 20-20-20 – It’s recommended you take a 20 second break every 20 minutes, and during that break look at something 20 feet away. This will give your eyes a nice rest every so often. 

• Consider special eyewear – First and foremost, check to see if your prescription is up to date for corrective lenses. This can help alleviate a lot of strain. There are also glasses specifically designed to reduce glare from digital screens – to achieve this special tints and coatings are applied directly to the lenses. They’re available in both prescription and non-prescription lenses.

No matter where we work, eye safety should be in the back of our minds. Eyes are windows to our world, and we should do everything we can to protect and keep them healthy.

Like so many diseases, few people know the warning signs of cataracts, or what to do about them. Cataracts are cloudy areas in the lens of the eye. They prevent light from passing through the lens (or lenses if both eyes are affected) and, as they become progressively worse, can make the patient’s vision similar to looking through frosted glass.

Below are symptoms that may indicate you are developing cataracts.

Cloudy or blurred vision

Cataracts start off small, so only a minimal area of your vision is initially impacted. You may occasionally look a specific direction and notice a blurred spot. It’s fairly common for patients to brush off these early signs. That clouded area will eventually grow, however, and overtake your full vision.

Lens discoloration

Cataracts cause a discoloration of the lens that result in patients beginning to notice that colors aren’t as bright as they once were. It’s like looking at life through a yellow or brownish film. Blues and purples are especially hard for the patient to distinguish as cataracts progress.

Light sensitivity, glare and halos

Cataracts can cause sunlight and lamps to seem uncomfortably bright. They can also cause patients to see glare around these light sources. When driving at night, a person developing cataracts will often see halos around the headlights of oncoming traffic.

Double vision

Double vision in one eye is common in cataract patients. Oddly enough, this may improve as the cataract grows larger and covers a larger portion of the lens’s surface. This is a dangerous symptom because it can throw off a person’s balance, so it should be checked out immediately.

Temporarily improved near vision

As strange as it may sound, some farsighted patients experience short-term vision improvement due to the impact cataracts have on the shape of the lens. They may even be able to read without the assistance of glasses for a short time. The improvement is only temporary, however.

Changes in vision

As pointed out above, cataracts can dramatically change your vision as they progress. As a result, patients developing cataracts frequently need changes to their eyewear prescriptions. A trained optometrist or ophthalmologist should be able to quickly recognize this issue in a patient.          

Presence of the symptoms above – individually or in combination – does not necessarily mean a patient has cataracts. Some symptoms can result from other eye diseases. Contact Gainesville Eye Physicians and Optical for a comprehensive exam, diagnosis and treatment plan.