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Los Gatos Eye Care
A Professional Optometric Corporation
15563 Union Ave.
Los Gatos, CA 95032
(408) 377-2020
fax: (408) 377-2022
Contact Lenses
“The key to learning how to put contacts in is keeping control of your eyelids. If you blink, the contact lens will come out. You need to be able to control your eyelids so even when you try to blink, you can't.”Cleaning Contact Lenses:
There are two things you are doing when you clean contact lenses. It's important to do both steps in order to properly care for your contacts. You should clean your contacts immediately after you remove them at night otherwise the dirt and oil will be harder to remove. Similar to why cleaning the dishes immediately after using them is easier than letting them sit overnight.
- Physically cleaning the dirt and oil: The multipurpose solutions have a “soap-like” cleanser which removes dirt and oil (similar to when you wash your dishes).
- Disinfecting: The multipurpose solutions also contain a disinfectant which kills viruses and bacteria. If you do not remove the dirt particles before disinfecting, the bacteria will “hide” inside the dirt particles as you soak your contact lenses overnight and will re-emerge in the morning unharmed.
There are, literally, hundreds of different contact lens materials. Each are made of a slightly different type of plastic. Contact lens plastic is porous (like a sponge). In order to determine the recommended replacement for each type of plastic, the FDA has patients wear the lens every day. Then they measure how long it takes for the lens to get “clogged up”. Studies show that once the patient starts to feel the lens becoming uncomfortable, the patient's corneas have been deprived of oxygen for about a week. The newer lenses have larger “pores” which is much healthier and allows for much more oxygen to pass through to the eye, but it also means the lens becomes “clogged up” more easily.
The reason why oxygen is important to the cornea is because the cornea is, literally, a dry tissue. If there was water in the cornea itself, the vision would never be clear. It would be like looking through a swimming pool. There are cells which pump water out of the cornea. These cells are fueled by oxygen. If there is a lack of oxygen, the cells stop working and the cornea swells with water. Oxygen is normally delivered to the cornea through the tear film. When you wear contact lenses, the amount of oxygen getting to the cornea is decreased. In some situations, the eye will actually grow blood vessels on to the cornea in order to bring oxygen. If these vessels grow too far onto the cornea, the vision may be affected. New blood vessel growth on the cornea is not healthy and can be a problem if left to continue growing.
CL Intolerance:
When a patient first starts wearing contact lenses, the immune system of the eye is very capable of fighting disease/infection. The longer a patient wears contact lenses and the more they “over wear” their contacts, the eyes become less and less able to recover from the decrease in oxygen created by contact lens wear. One of the most common “side-effects” of contact lens over wear is what is termed, “Contact Lens Intolerance”. Over time, the contacts become less and less comfortable and, at some point, the patient may not be able to tolerate contact lens wear at all (no matter how many different brands are tried.) This can be a very frustrating condition and can only be prevented by good compliance with the recommendations given by the doctor throughout the period of contact lens wear.
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