The vision to look at
THE GIFT of sight allows people to live in variety of colors and see God’s beautiful creations. It helps people connect to its environment and interact with another person, sensing the deepest connection through direct eye contact. Indeed, sight is vital in everyday life, allowing people to live comfortably and navigate their way to success.
Considering that a huge part of the brain is dedicated for vision, eyes are one of the most important sense organ that should be given proper care. For many reasons, vision deteriorates and may develop to blindness and serious visual loss.
The World Health Organization estimates that 285 million people worldwide are visually impaired, where 39 million are blind and 246 million have low vision. Of the total number, 80% of visual impairment can be avoided through prevention and proper eye treatment.
“Vision is one of the most important senses, therefore, it comes with it that protecting your eyes is one of the most basic things that the person should do. It’s a basic need, it’s essential like breathing and eating. Of course it’s not essential for life per se but in order to have a normal life and to live in this world, you really need your sight,” Dr. Ruben Lim-Bon- Siong, ophthalmologist at St. Luke’s Medical Center and president of the Philippine Cornea Society, said in an interview with BusinessWorld.
Low vision and blindness can occur from birth or develop gradually over time. Dr. Lim-Bon-Siong identified and classified the reasons why and how vision deteriorates into four groups. These are congenital, due to diseases, aging and eye trauma.
Congenital refers to the various conditions present at birth that affect the vision. Some congenital eye conditions are astigmatism, nearsightedness and farsightedness, which are highly dependent on the shape and length of the eye. Just like height, skin and hair color, these traits are passed through genes or inherited from the parents.
“If both of your parents is nearsighted, the chances are three out of four of the kids will be nearsighted,” Dr. Lim-BonSiong said.
Vision deterioration are also caused by diseases like diabetes and glaucoma. Dr. Lim-Bon-Siong shared that diabetic complications on the eye is the most common cause of blindness in adult age group. The most serious eye condition associated with diabetes is diabetic retinopathy, a condition that occurs resulting to damaged blood vessels of the retina. Meanwhile, glaucoma, an eye condition that damages optic nerve, is one of the main causes of irreversible blindness.
As a person gets older, the condition of the eye changes and some problems become more common. Cataract, the principal cause of blindness worldwide, is the most common cause of vision deterioration in people aging over 40 years old while age- related macular degeneration (AMB) is another problem with the retina that is commonly seen in patients aged 70 or 80 years old above.
Eye trauma or eye injuries can also cause vision deterioration. It refers to eye damaged caused by direct hit to the eye such as scratching and accident.
Dr. Lim- Bon- Siong enumerated measures to prevent eye damage and ways to maintain good eyesight.
DON’TS: PREVENTIVE MEASURES TO AVOID EYE PROBLEMS
Dr. Lim-Bon- Siong shared that he encountered a lot of patients suffering from eye trauma and all of these are preventable. The first advice he mentioned is to avoid eye injuries that may seriously damage the eyes by simply not putting oneself in a situation where eyes can be possibly hurt.
Don’t do self-medication, he said. “If you feel something is wrong — the eye is blurring, and it’s constant or progressive, then, you have to see an eye doctor immediately, and don’t wait until it is really really bad,” Dr. Lim-Bon-Siong explained.
Certain things and drugs can cause blindness. Dr. Lim-Bon-Siong advised to not put anything into the eye as there are drugs, especially not registered or regulated ones, that can cause severe harm.
He also reminded that there are medications such as ethambutol, a drug used to treat tuberculosis, that causes bad side effects to the eyes.