Keeping your eyes safe is incredibly important, but whether you are looking for low vision aids or eye protection for any activity, there is an overwhelming choice when choosing eyewear. Knowing how to choose eyewear that works for you is something you do need to learn, and to help raise awareness about the importance of using the right types of eyewear, every year we have National Eyewear Day to spread the word.
The History of National Eyewear Day
National Eyewear Day is held on June 6th each year, and was founded by Zyloware Eyewear, a glasses manufacturer, in 2016. The goal of the day is to celebrate the styles and options we have available today to protect our eyes, improve our vision and add new style to our looks.
By raising awareness of the importance of the use of eyeglasses, and the breadth of innovation and quality available in the eyewear market, National Eyewear Day is designed to connect people with the tools they need to maintain or improve their vision.
Common Types of Eyewear
When we think about types of eyewear, for most people it is focused on low vision aids or glasses to correct visual acuity. However, there are actually a number of different scenarios championed by National Eyewear Day beyond corrective lenses for vision health. Here are the main types of eyewear that can help correct and protect vision you may find a use for in daily life.
Eyeglasses to correct visual acuity
Whether reading glasses or something for permanent vision correction, glasses are the familiar eyewear we probably see and use most frequently. They offer lenses designed to correct problems with sight, including both nearsightedness (Myopia) and farsightedness (Hyperopia). While most lenses in these types of eyewear are for a single corrective solution, there are bi-focal options that can help with both near and far focal issues, and varifocals that can correct vision at all distances with a single lens.
Contact lens
Carrying on with eyewear to correct visual acuity, contact lenses can be used in the same way as eyeglasses, but are invisible in use. Placed on the eye itself, these thin membranes provide the visual correction needed, and can be either single use disposable types, or reusable lenses that require a stringent cleaning regime. Again, as with corrective eyeglasses, they can correct both Myopia and Hyperopia, and are often chosen by those who need visual correction for style reasons, preferring them to glasses.
However, that is not the only type of contact lens on offer. Contacts are also available that change the eye’s appearance, from Iris color to shape, they can dramatically change how eyes look, and even be used to provide a level of protection too.
Sunglasses to prevent ultraviolet rays
In daily life, our eyes are vulnerable to a number risks from dust and other contaminants that can cause irritation or in some cases infections, but the most common is the sun itself. Ultraviolet rays from the sun can cause severe eye damage through prolonged exposure. Over time, lens proteins can be modified by those rays, causing cataracts and even a number of types of eye cancer.
Sunglasses block those UV rays, providing eye protection when the sun is strong. They are also something of a fashion accessory too, with endless styles, shapes, sizes and colors to suit every taste. While blocking UV rays is their main use, sunglasses also improve vision in bright sunlight too, so are useful aids when driving for instance, eliminating sun glare and other hazards. Lenses come in a range of colors, or can also be reactive, getting darker in color, and therefore blocking more of the light, as the light they are exposed to increases.
Protective eyewear for sports or workplaces
If you enjoy swimming, mountain biking or any number of sports, you know that there can be risks for your eye health when participating. From infections to a risk of injury trauma, it makes sense to wear eye protection when participating in sports that put your vision at risk in any way. It is the same with work, for anyone who solders or welds, cuts metals, uses abrasive chemicals and more, anything that offers the chance of something hazardous contacting the eye itself or surrounding area, eye protection mitigates risk and gives you confidence.
If there are two options, risk potential damage to your eyes or wear glasses to protect vision, then it is simply the sensible choice to wear glasses. These types of eye protection come in many forms, swimming glasses have a seal to keep water out, cycling glasses come in a range of lens colors to provide enhanced vision in different conditions, as do skiing goggles. Workwear tends to be larger, clear and more robust to offer strong eye protection in the industrial environment.
Low vision aids for the visually impaired
There are a number of products and technologies available designed for visually impaired people to help them in daily tasks. These low vision aids include products such as the Acesight E-glasses present technology-based solutions to improve visual acuity. Low vision aids are a special variety of eyewear that particularly offer to people with vision loss and contribute to enriching their life. Moreover, from a more comprehensive perspective, low vision aids not only include wearable E-glasses but also those electronic video magnifiers, which give more choices to improve the life quality of people with visual impairments.
How to Choose the Right Eyewear
With such a variety of different eyewear on the market, knowing how to choose eyewear to meet your needs is really important. Here are some things to look for when selecting eyewear for any application.
Check the material
The materials that these types of eyewear are made from may seem irrelevant but can be incredibly important. For instance, in situations where there is a chance of the eyewear being broken, such as wearing them when cycling, having glass lenses would be incredibly dangerous. Instead, shatterproof materials allow good performance without the risk, and even in a crash will not cause damage to the eye. For glasses to improve visual performance, it is the clarity that matters most, and here other materials may be best.
Examine the eyesight situation
When looking for types of eyewear to rectify visual acuity, it is important to understand the visual problem they must deal with. Your choice of low vision aids will be impacted by the kind of visual correction needed. For instance, if you need bi-focal or varifocal lenses then your range of eyewear options may be more limited than single corrective lenses.
Pay attention to eye hygiene
Contact lenses are often chosen as they are virtually invisible in use, however because they are placed on the eye itself, they also come with some additional responsibilities. While dirt on your glasses is annoying, dirt on your contact lens can lead to irritation of your eye or even infection and visual problems.
Maintaining cleanliness is essential with contacts, and there are two main approaches. The first is single use contacts, they are provided in hygienic packaging, taken out, used and disposed of. The next day, a new pair of contacts is used. This is convenient, but can add to the cost, and of course, not as sustainable as the alternative. Reusable contacts are as they seem, you buy your contacts and use them, taking them out at night and refitting them in the morning. This approach requires a careful cleaning regime to ensure they are spotless when reusing.
It is important to consider this extra workload or expense when choosing between contacts and eyeglasses.
Select low vision aids according to people’s different needs
There are so many low vision aids to choose from, some look amazing, and the use of technology can make them seem very cool and desirable. However, it is important to choose these aids based on what the visually impaired people actually need. For instance, Acesight E-glasses can be perfect for those who require for hands-free and would like to walk around when wearing the device because of the transparent design of the mask. And it is also an ideal option to see clearly the faces of your loved ones.
The important point is to assess the need first, and then choose the product that best fulfills those needs.
Eyewear can help people in all sorts of ways, and National Eyewear Day is a great initiative to raise awareness of how useful they can be. If just one person finds a product to improve their visual acuity or protect their eyes from injury due to the publicity from this day each year, it is well worth the effort to be a part of it.
