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Living with contact lenses

If you wear glasses, have you ever wondered if switching to contacts would give you an image boost? Or can’t you face the fuss of cleaning those fiddly little things every night?

The good news is that switching to lenses isn’t the trauma it used to be. Plus, vanity isn’t the only reason to give them a go. Contact lenses give you an all-round view compared to the slightly framed view of the world you get with glasses. And when it comes to bungee jumping, white water rafting or snogging, glasses just get in the way.

Most people can wear contacts these days. ‘A lot of people with dry eyes are told that they can’t, but you can still wear them socially two or three times a week,’ says optometrist Vanessa Ho-Yan from 20/20 optical store in London. Your optician will help you decide which contacts are most suitable for you. Here’s a guide to what’s on offer.

Hard or soft lenses?
‘The old type of hard lenses were made from a material that didn’t let any oxygen get to the eye, so little holes had to be made in them,’ says Ho-Yan. ‘If your eyes get starved of oxygen, blood vessels in the eye start to shoot off and new ones develop. In the long-term, the cornea can lose its transparency. The rigid gas permeable lens was then developed, which allows more oxygen to get through.’ Today’s rigid gas permeable versions are generally referred to as ‘hard’ lenses.

Soft lenses, made from gel-like plastics are all gas permeable, and offer many different levels of water content, allowing different levels of oxygen to reach the eye. Many people opt for soft lenses because they’re generally more comfortable than hard lenses. But in certain cases hard lenses are still preferable.

‘Hard lenses are great if you have astigmatism (an egg shaped eye) as they can be moulded to correct the egg-shape,’ says Ho-Yan. ‘It doesn’t give you absolutely perfect sight, but can correct corneal astigmatism for levels up to about 2.5 to 3 dioptres. Practitioner opinion on this can differ,’ she says.

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