Get Your Contact Lenses

Which Contact Lense Material Is Right For You?

What your contact lenses are made of affects how they wear in many senses of the word, including how long they last, your comfort and their health impact. For many years contact lenses were made of glass. Today, fewer than 1% are, with the other 99% made from various types of plastic. The choices are predominantly some type of PMMA (polymethyl methacrylate), polycarbonate or silicon hydroxy gel.

Hard contact lenses introduced in the 1960s are made of PMMA and don’t allow oxygen to move directly through the lens, but some air does reach under it anyway. When a person blinks the lens moves slightly and some air diffuses through the tear solution that covers the eyeball.

Soft contact lenses, first introduced in 1971, were made of a polyacrylamide containing nitrogen (hydroxyethyl methacrylate or HEMA) which made them what is called ‘hydrophilic’. This ability to absorb water makes them flexible, and therefore more comfortable. At the same time, they are slightly more permeable to air than their older cousins.

RGP (Rigid Gas Permeable) lenses are midway between a truly hard lens, like glass or PMMA, and a soft lens. They combine PMMA with silicone and fluoropolymers that allow air to get to the eye. That increases your comfort and reduces the odds of health problems due to long-term wear.

Extended wear lenses, which come in anywhere from 2-day to 7-day to even 30-day use models, are made of silicon hydroxy gel. That material allows up to seven times the amount of oxygen to pass through the lens, making it possible to wear them longer than others.

Disposable lenses, first introduced in 1987, have now become extremely popular. They can be worn daily for a week or two and removing them every night is an option. Most are designed to be worn continuously then simply thrown away. Made from a combination of a polymer called etafilcon (42%) and water (58%), they’re very thin, flexible and have excellent gas permeability.

Disposables are especially popular among sports enthusiasts because of the fact that they fit close to the eye, making them very difficult to dislodge. They’re also very comfortable, so they can be easily ignored during activity. However, many don’t offer quite the level of crystal clear vision as other types, so they’re not suitable for everyone. Also, they don’t correct some vision problems as well as other types, which limits their use for some.

Apart from the choice of material and wear characteristics, there are several options today in contact lenses that simply didn’t exist 20 years ago.

Single vision lenses are like a pair of glasses worn close to the eye. They were once the only choice. Today, bifocals in contact lenses are possible. Even multifocal or progressive lenses are an option. These help compensate for presbyopia, a type of farsightedness that affects nearly everyone as they age, typically beginning in the mid-40s.

Investigate your options and you’ll soon find a pair of contact lenses just right for you and your lifestyle.

Choosing The Right Contact Lense Solution

Choosing The Right Contact Lense Solution For You

Modern contact lenses are comfortable, long-lasting (unless by design, as in disposables) and very safe. However, there are some risks and limitations in wearing them and knowing what those are can help you choose the lenses solution that’s best for you. Of course, any such decision should be made in consultation with your eye care professional at a local Optician.

Since 1986 many wearers have opted for Rigid Gas Permeable (RGP) contact lenses. Contemporary designs allow for up to five times more oxygen diffusion through the plastic than those of the past. That feature is important in reducing the odds of corneal infection. The less oxygen that makes it to the eye, the higher the risk of an infection.

On the downside, RGP lenses are a little less flexible than other types, making them less comfortable for some. But, they may be better for correcting astigmatism as a result. They also can last up to 2-3 years, which is a longer duration than typical soft contact lenses.

Many will prefer some type of soft lens, made from special hydrophilic plastic polymers that provide a lens that is flexible and therefore more comfortable. Current manufacturing methods have it possible, to produce a lens that doesn’t suffer from a high likelihood of tearing, as did those in previous times, but they do require more frequent replacement. Soft lenses also stay in place extremely well and require a shorter adjustment period.

Yet, for many, a hard lens is still the only option. While often less comfortable, and even though they increase the odds of scarring or infection slightly, their inflexibility is important. The eyes of some patients simply require the rigidity of this type and they prefer not to revert to wearing glasses. Those with certain types of astigmatism may not be able to wear soft lenses and require a less flexible option instead.

Additional Contact Lense Solutions

Daily wear contacts are intended to be worn during the day, then taken out before bed. They account for about 80% of contact lens wearers. Here the advantages and disadvantages become more evident. It can be a minor inconvenience to insert and remove contact lenses every day. Whenever they’re removed they have to be sterilized using a multi purpose solution, typically overnight, before re-inserting the next morning.

But daily wear contacts (currently) provide the best possible option for those looking to achieve the absolute minimum risk of eye infection and scarring. Allowing the eye to relax along with sufficient exposure to air, keeps it in the best health. All contacts today reduce oxygen exposure somewhat and usually well below the level the eye would receive without them.

Taking them out at night also reduces the odds to zero of having the contact slide off the cornea during sleep, where it could be a pain (literally and figuratively) to retrieve in the morning.

Still, touching the eye and/or the contact is also not completely without risk, and the process is a little inconvenient. Fewer changes can also be good. For those whose doctors say it’s safe, extended wear contacts are an appropriate option. They’re designed to be worn anywhere from overnight (2 days) to a week or even up to a month at a time, depending on the design and the patient.

That convenience factor comes at a price, in pounds and risk.

They are inclined to be more expensive though prices change over time, of course, usually falling from a high. They also reduce the air-eye contact, which ups the odds of infection slightly. Extended wear lenses also up the odds slightly of something going wrong, since they sit in the eye longer.

Some models, particularly the 30-day type, are somewhat stiffer and therefore slightly less comfortable. In every case, the possibility of problems with modern contact lens models is still quite low for those individuals whose eyes adapt to long-term wearing.

Investigate the options in consultation with your Optician, and you’ll soon find the right contact lense solution for you.