5 Reasons Why Eye Examination Is Important
The importance of annual eye examination is well beyond just making sure your vision is not blurry. Here are five reasons why eye examinations are important, and why you should have annual eye exams to safeguard your health and wellness.
1) Eye examinations help students perform well in school
80 percent of the children are expected to learn in and outside the classroom that requires good vision! It is related to our society nowadays, and that statistic probably should be revised upward because of the ever-increasing amount of screen time students are exposed to these days.
An annual eye examination is the only way to ensure your child is seeing clearly and comfortably to perform well in the classroom. It is also the only way to know for sure if the kids are seeing their best for sports and/or other activities too.
2) Myopia is becoming an epidemic
The number of students who are developing myopia (nearsightedness) is growing faster than ever. More kids are getting nearsighted at a very early age.
It is a big concern for students who become nearsighted very early in life. They tend to experience a worsening and progression of nearsightedness that continues throughout childhood. This puts them at a significantly greater risk of very serious and potentially sight-threatening eye conditions later in life, including cataracts, glaucoma and retinal detachment.
By scheduling annual eye examinations is the best way to assess your child’s risk of myopia. When detected early, myopia control measures can be taken to slow the progression of myopia and reduce your child’s risk of serious eye problems later in life.
3) Vision Screenings are no substitute for an eye examination
Very commonly, parents are led to believe their child is seeing perfectly well because she passed a school vision screening. Or even working adults think they see perfectly because they pass a vision screening at driving schools. Frequently, neither of these assumptions are correct.
Vision screenings are done to screen out individuals who have serious (usually quite obvious) vision problems. Screenings can identify apparent problems a person might have with specific visual tasks, such as seeing the projector clearly in the classroom or recognizing road signs and other objects from behind the driver’s seat.
Only a comprehensive eye examination by an Optometrist or Ophthalmologist can ensure your vision is as clear and comfortable as possible. They can also verify that you are free from potentially serious eye diseases that do not have obvious early symptoms, including glaucoma and even eye cancer.
4) Glaucoma
Of all serious eye diseases, glaucoma is probably the most sneakiest. That is because there are no obvious symptoms in most cases of early glaucoma. There is no signal to alert you when something is going wrong.
People who fail to have routine eye examinations and develop glaucoma typically become aware of it only after they have suffered from permanent vision loss from the disease. By that time, controlling glaucoma to prevent additional vision loss can be challenging. Without successful control with medical treatment and/or glaucoma surgery, the disease can lead to blindness.
Any early detection of high eye pressure and other risk factors for glaucoma is possible only with routine eye examinations. Vision screenings do little to nothing to identify or prevent glaucoma.
5) Annual eye examinations can detect other serious health problems too
There’s a saying : “The Eye is the window to our soul.”. It turns out to be a very effective window to our overall health to detect serious health conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and even cancer.
During a comprehensive eye examination, your Singapore Optometrist or Ophthalmologist can observe and evaluate the health and condition of the blood vessels in your retina which are a good predictor of the health of blood vessels throughout your body. It is also the only blood vessels that can be seen without invasive method. Conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels are all visible by changes in the appearance of the blood supply and blood vessels in the retina.
Annual eye examinations in Singapore are especially important for anyone with diabetes or at risk for the disease.
Commonly, people with diabetes are at risk of developing diabetic eye disease. Most Singaporeans are unaware of this disease as they do not have regular health or eye examination done yearly. In early stages, diabetic eye disease has no visible symptoms, only regular comprehensive eye examination can detect signs of the disease so treatment can begin soon enough to prevent vision loss.
Find out how to get an eyecheck, please click here or email emmevisioncare@gmail.com or contact +65 9383 8569 for further inquiries.