Skip to main content

Contacts have all of the benefits of glasses without the annoying maintenance of wearing, cleaning and fixing them. While contacts are much easier to take care of, it is important to remember to clean them and change them as instructed by your doctor. If you forget about these simple contact hygiene tips, then you risk damaging your eyes. Here is how you can keep your contacts in the best shape for your eyes.

Replace Your Contacts

Most contacts prescribed by optometrists are either daily, weekly or monthly lenses. This means that after the time period has passed, you need to throw the lenses out and put in a fresh pair. If you keep wearing the contacts past the replacement date, then your chance of an eye infection increases. An old pair of contacts increases your risk for developing a bacterial infection.

Take Your Contacts Out at Night

Keeping your contacts in overnight will dry out the contacts and your eyes. The dryness comes from the lack of tear exchange which provides a perfect scenario for bacteria to grow on your contacts and eye. Not only this, the dried out contact can also scratch and rub the inside of your eyelid which can cause major discomfort. Do yourself a favor and spend the extra 10 seconds to take out your contacts before you hit the hay.

Clean Them in Solution

Cleaning your contacts in contact solution, such as Opti-Free, is important when cleaning your contacts. These solutions are designed, filtered and made to clean contacts that you put in your eyes every day. Tap water, on the other hand, is not. Tap water, our daily drinking water, has bacteria that are not visible to the human eye and can contaminate our contacts and eye health.

Take Out Contacts When Swimming

Simply put, you should either take out your contacts or put on goggles before entering the pool. Like tap water, many different kinds of bacteria and chemicals are found in pools, especially public ones. Not only do you risk an infection, but you can also lose a valuable lens if your friend or someone else splashes you.

Conclusion

Contacts are a great way to correct your vision. But if not taken care of properly, you can subject yourself to eye infections and ocular damage. Always wash your contacts with contact lens solution and never swim in your contacts. Both tap water and pool water can cause nasty infections that will cause you a big headache and maybe even a lasting impact. Also, don’t forget to take them out and replace them when necessary in order to protect your eye from scratches and infections. Your eyes are one of the most important organs in the body, so make sure you are following these tips to keep your eyes nice and healthy!

Do you need to order contacts or a schedule an eye exam in Lubbock?  Schedule an appointment with Drs. Gibson, Gibson & Moore today!

Drs. Gibson, Gibson & Moore

Author Drs. Gibson, Gibson & Moore

More posts by Drs. Gibson, Gibson & Moore

Leave a Reply