Myopia Management
Myopia Management
Child short-sightedness
At your child’s eye exam, does it worry you that they need stronger glasses? Would you like to slow the rate of progression of their myopia or child short-sightedness, so that their final projected prescription is halved?
Myopia Management is the slowing or reduction of the rate of progression of your child’s myopia using specialist contact lenses or glasses, lifestyle advice and regular monitoring.
So what is child short-sightedness or Myopia?
Myopia is blurry long-distance vision, often called “short-sighted’’ or “near-sighted”. A person with myopia can see clearly up close – when reading a book or looking at a phone – but words and objects look fuzzy on a blackboard, on television.
Short-sightedness, or myopia, typically starts in childhood and usually requires glasses or contact lenses.
If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to be short-sighted, our vision simulator helps to give some answers.
How child short-sightedness progress
A child with short-sightedness may need a stronger prescription as they continue to grow. Prescription changes happen at a different rate for each child, so regular eye examinations are important to ensure they can see clearly.
Stronger prescriptions mean thicker glasses and children will become more and more reliant on them to see. While this is inconvenient, it may also lead to an increased risk of future eye health problems such as retinal detachments myopic macular degeneration, glaucoma and cataracts
Causes of child short-sightedness
Short-sightedness is most commonly caused by the eye growing too long. Certain factors make a child more likely to become short-sighted, such as:
What can we do to help?
Firstly, book an appointment (here). Our Optometrists have extensive experience in myopia management and can advise suitable treatment tailored specifically for your child we look at family history, age and current prescription, environmental and lifestyle factors to calculate the likelihood of progression and the likely final prescription.
At this appointment we discuss all the options available for your child, so we can tailor-make a treatment solution individually for them. We also give advice on lifestyle changes. You can then make an informed decision as to the best option for your child.
At ABM Opticians, we monitor myopia management patients every 6 months. This often includes measuring axial length of the eye along with checking their prescription or refraction.
If we feel an alternative option would be more beneficial for managing the axial length or prescription, we would discuss this at your regular myopia control appointments
Although there is currently no cure for myopia, we may able to fit your child with contact lenses that may slow down the progression of Myopia.
Yes. Myopia is expected to affect 50% of the world population by 2050. In the UK, the amount of myopia has increased from 10% to 23% of children in the past 50 years.
Yes. Generally, once you have myopia your spectacle prescription gets greater over time, in particular during childhood as the eye grows. The key years of change in myopia are between six and 17 years old with the largest change in prescription typically happening at around age seven to eight years and changes getting less as you get older.
We know that using the traditional method of single vision distance glasses, myopia rates progress throughout childhood/ teenage years. This leads to stronger glasses which are more costly and have thicker lenses which is less cosmetically pleasing.
Research shows increased risk of eye disease for patients with myopia including retinal detachment, myopic macula degeneration, glaucoma and cataract. These risks are apparent even for small levels of myopia and increase with increasing myopia.
So could your child by Myopic? How do I know?
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Dual focus contact lenses
Dual focus contact lenses, such as MiSight® 1 day are worn during the day to correct vision and slow down the progression of short-sightedness in children. MiSight® 1 day is just like a soft daily disposable contact lens but with a special optical design, proven to slow down the speed at which short-sightedness progresses.
Contact Lenses designed for children
MiSight® 1 day is a daily disposable contact lens designed for children so they can get the dual benefit of clear, spectacle-free vision and the possibility of slowing down prescription changes by 59% on average.
We now offer the Brilliant Futures™ Myopia Management Programme from CooperVision which includes the proven MiSight® 1 day contact lenses providing you with information, support and regular assessment. The programme is specially designed to maximise the success of slowing down your child’s short-sightedness.
Children as young as 8 can successfully wear contact lenses and tell us they:
- Feel more competent when taking part in sport and other physical activities
- Feel better about their appearance
- Feel better about fitting in with their friends
How to apply and remove contact lenses
At ABM Opticians we will help you with application and care, our fully trained staff are available to answer your questions or queries, we’ve added some helpful videos to watch on how to apply and remove your lenses.
