New view to reducing myopia with special lens

[Fisbike]

Anyone has experiences or knows where to get this kind of lens?

 

New view to reducing myopia with special lens

 

SINGAPORE: Ten-year-old Sherwyn started wearing spectacles to correct his myopia just two years ago, but what alarmed his mother Michelle Cheong was the worsening of his myopia by about a hundred degrees a year.

 

To help children like Sherwyn fight short-sightedness, new lenses that have been clinically proven to slow down myopia progression in children by up to 30 per cent were developed by optical products developer and manufacturer Carl Zeiss Vision.

 

The new lenses, called MyoVision, make use of Peripheral Vision Management Technology, which corrects the image on the central part of the retina as well as on the periphery, by curving it so that it stays entirely on the retina.

 

This is different from the normal method used in optometry to correct myopia, which is to adjust the distance of images through the use of lenses.

 

Short-sightedness, also known as myopia, is more common in Asian countries - with over 50 per cent of 11- to 13-year-olds developing the condition in urban populations.

 

Compared to the rest of the world, Singapore has one of the highest prevalence of myopia, with about 30 per cent of children with the condition when entering school at age six, growing to 80 per cent of the population by the time they are 18 years old.

 

Asians also have a higher hereditary rate as compared to Western counterparts, with 60-per-cent of them being more likely to develop myopia if both parents have the condition which makes objects appear blurred at a distance.

 

Compounding the common eye problem in Asia is the fact that there is no way to completely stop or cure myopia progression due to continuing eye elongation.

 

But now, the team behind MyoVision said they have made a breakthrough.

 

The new lenses look and feel like what have been used so far by optometrists. The only difference is that while vision through the lenses is sharp when a user looks straight ahead, vision at the sides is blurred.

 

The lenses also do not not provide as wide a spectrum of clear sight as normal spectacles.

 

Still, children who tested out the lenses said they only needed a few days to get used to their new lenses, especially when used during sports or playing instruments.

 

"At first (Sherwyn) had a bit of trouble playing the piano, as he couldn't see keys further away using the side of his eyes and he had to turn his head a lot more," said his mother, Michelle. "But after a day or two, when he got used to it, he could play the piano perfectly."

 

A three-year study of 700 children in Australia and China who used the lenses found the myopia progression slowing down by some 30 per cent.

 

"What we find in the study is that the lenses are controlling both the length of the eye and the prescription," said Professor Brien Holden, chief executive officer of Vision Cooperative Research Centre.

 

"So the evidence is that if they stop wearing the lenses, the eye will not rebound - it will stay the way it is, but it'll stop having the effect of the reduction."

 

Singapore is the third country in which the product is being made available to the public, after China and South Korea.

 

"The idea that we can control the growth of the eye to limit the progress of myopia... is a breakthrough in vision correction for billions of people around the world," said Prof Holden.

 

Currently, the MyoVision lenses only work on children and not adults whose eyes and vision have settled in. The other setback is the price tag. The lenses cost S$360 a pair, which is about three times more than normal lenses.

 

But Michelle said: "I