Those Mobile Devices

I was doing an examination on a five year old boy yesterday.  Not only was the mom looking at her device, but her two year old son was also. 

Over the last several decades, increased near work has attributed to the increase of near-sightedness in the population.  When I went to optometry school over 30 years ago, the average population was far-sighted while the average population in the optometry school was near-sighted.

It's hard to predict how the tremendous amount of close up work everyone is doing, especially very young children, will haveon one's vision.  There definitely won't be a shortage of patients.

A Little Prescription Goes A Long Way

I had a nine-year-old boy come in last week for an examination.  The mom related he was going to be tested for educational deficiencies.  The child basically couldn't see any of the letters on the distant chart and had to hold print exceedingly close to read it. 

When I examined the boy, I found he had a very low prescription.  With this he was able to see the distant chart.  More importantly, when I put the lenses in front of the boy while reading, the mom marveled at how he had never read this fluidly before.  He was also reading at a normal distance.

In rare circumstances, a youngster's focusing system will spasm, both causing headaches and blurred vision at distance and near.  A mild prescription in some of these cases makes all the difference in the world.  It certainly did with this individual.