Halloween is so much fun planning and wearing costumes that change us. Some are tempted to change their eyes as part of the costume. The American Optometric Association (AOA) offers valuable information to protect your eyes from non-prescribed contact lenses.

Some Halloween enthusiasts may wear decorative contact lenses, which can change a person’s eye color or create the effect of a character like a cat, zombie, or vampire, as part of their costume. However, if these lenses are bought without a prescription from an eye doctor, they could lead to serious health issues and potentially damage your eyesight.

All contact lenses are classified as medical devices by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and require a valid prescription, whether they correct your vision or are worn simply for a special occasion, like Halloween, proms or weddings. “Even though these are non-corrective lenses, they still pose the same potential health and safety risks as other contact lenses,” said Glenda Secor, O.D., chair of the AOA’s Contact Lens and Cornea Section.

However, some decorative lenses are sold illegally through flea markets, the Internet, beauty salons, convenience stores, and even national retailers. The AOA warns that you should never buy lenses from these sources. “When purchased over-the-counter, decorative contact lenses can put people at risk for bacterial infections, allergic reactions, or even significant damage to the eye’s ability to function, with the potential for irreversible sight loss. Sadly, numerous ca
ses of serious harm have been documented,” added Dr. Secor.

According to the AOA’s 2013 American Eye-Q® consumer survey, 17 percent of Americans have worn decorative contact lenses that don’t provide vision correction as part of a costume or for other cosmetic purposes. Of those individuals, 24 percent purchased them without a prescription from a source other than an eye doctor – a great concern to doctors of optometry.

“Don’t buy contacts from any store or website that doesn’t require an eye doctor’s prescription,” adds Dr. Secor. “In other words, if you can walk in off the street, or log-on to a website and buy them without verification of your prescription, the lenses are not being sold legally.”

It’s important to have a medical eye and vision examination from your optometrist to be sure you are a good candidate for contact lenses and your cornea can safely tolerate the lens
es. Your eye doctor will also make sure your lenses fit properly and teach you how to safely care for your lenses.

“One of the safest things consumers can do is visit an eye doctor for a consultation,” said Dr. Secor. “This way they can obtain the proper prescription and lens material, and ensure a healthy contact lens fit, reducing the risk of infection or other serious side effects.”

The AOA offers the following recommendations for all contact lens wearers:
• Wear contact lenses only if they are fitted and prescribed by an optometrist.

• Do not purchase contact lenses from gas stations, video stores, websites, or any other place not authorized by law to dispense contact lenses.

• Make sure contact lenses are properly cleaned and disinfected as instructed by your eye-care professional.

• Make sure you wash your hands before handling and cleaning your contact lenses.

• Never swap or share contact lenses with anyone.

• Never sleep while wearing contact lenses unless they are extended-wear lenses specifically designed for that purpose.

Before you make any decisions about your eyes and for more information about the risks associated with decorative contact lenses please ask Dr. Craig.

Happy 4th of July!

The Fourth of July Holiday is filled with many fun activities, including fireworks, hiking, backyard barbecue and spending time with family and friends.  We know many of you enjoy setting off fireworks but fireworks are dangerous and can cause injuries to the eyes that may cause blindness.   Eye injuries range from a corneal abrasion to a retinal detachment to rupture of the eye. Whatever your plans, we just want you to have a safe and fun holiday.

It you are going to set off your own fireworks please review the following tips to prevent injury.  Attend a professional fireworks show is the best way to avoid injury from fireworks.   

• View firework displays from at least 500 feet away.
• Never let children play with fireworks, even sparklers (they can heat up to 2,000 degrees).
• Wear eye protection, such as safety goggles, if you are handling the fireworks yourself.
• Light only one firework at a time.
• Do not attempt to relight or clean up exploded fireworks yourself. Alert the local fire department or the police for help.

If you get debris in your eye or you have injured your eye:

• Call Dr. Craig’s pager immediately at 304-987-9113
• Do not rub or rinse your eyes
• Do not apply pressure
• Do not remove any objects that are stuck in the eye
• Do not apply ointments or take any blood-thinning pain medications such as aspirin or ibuprofen.

The FECC wishes you a safe and happy 4th

An optometrist explains #TheDress debate

The original image—from Swiked on Tumblr—is in the middle, with a color-balanced “white and gold” image on the left, and “blue and black” image on the right.

The Internet went into a frenzy yesterday because of a photo of a dress. The photo was posted to Tumblr, and as it spread, people divided into “Team White and Gold” and “Team Blue and Black.”

The Tumblr user ‘swiked’ captioned the photo, in part, “is this dress white and gold, or blue and black? Me and my friends can’t agree…” The photo was picked up by the popular website Buzzfeed, and the hashtag #TheDress has been trending on Twitter ever since. Why? Because people simply cannot agree about the colors of the dress—which are actually blue and black.

It turns out there’s a scientific explanation for the visual discrepancy.

Geoffrey Goodfellow, O.D., chair of the AOA Communications Content Committee and faculty member at Illinois College of Optometry, explains that color is a visual perception, and is therefore open to interpretation and different to all people.

“We have three different color-sensing receptors in our eyes that identify different levels of red, green and blue,” Dr. Goodfellow says. “As visible light in the world interacts with these receptors, each of the three color sensors are stimulated in different amounts that are interpreted by the brain as a particular color.”

There are multiple other factors that influence how we perceive color, too.

“Color is influenced by the lighting, and the same color swatch can appear very differently under different lighting conditions,” Dr. Goodfellow adds. “Even though the physical swatch has not changed, our perception of its color can change. There are many other complicated mechanisms that our brain uses to detect color, pattern, and light changes, so colors are also perceived differently depending on what other colors are adjacent to them. We also have many learned responses to how light interacts in our world that bias our perception of color.”

Some social media users have noted that after looking at the photo for a prolonged period of time, the colors “changed.” Dr. Goodfellow has an answer for this.

“Staring at a particular color for a long time can also cause chromatic adaptation, which causes our brain to change its color perception of that object and other objects that we look at immediately after looking at the colored object,” he says.

When talking about the photo of the dress specifically, Dr. Goodfellow states that the color can be analyzed in many different ways. For example, one could measure color pixels on a computer or use one’s experience with flash photography (for example, sometimes white colors are photographed with a “cool” white light and look blue). So the way this particular photo was shot, the lighting and the color balance all play a part. Another photo of the very same dress might not have caused such color confusion.

“In addition, I could be entranced by the meme and stare and stare and realize that it is changing color before my eyes because of chromatic adaptation. Color is certainly in the eye of the beholder and is influenced by what assumptions and experiences we bring to the table,” says Dr. Goodfellow.