Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Children Eye Health and Safety

It is a good idea to have your child's eyes and vision examined by an eye care professional (optometrist or ophthalmologist) at least once a year. Scheduling this around your child's birthday is a good way to remember to do it (and is also a birthday gift of sight!). Do not wait until your child complains of blurred vision, red eyes, and/or headaches. And do not rely on the school's vision screening program because that is designed to only detect the more common eye and vision problems (pink eye, nearsightedness, etc.) in asymptomatic children.
Children often do not know how they should be seeing because they assume everyone sees the way they do. Because of this, the American Optometric Association recommends that all children receive a professional eye and vision examination at critical stages in their visual development. These critical stages are
  • By six months of age
  • At 3 years of age
  • Before first grade
  • At least every year between ages 6 and 18 while they are continuing to grow
By having your child's eyes examined at these critical stages of development, permanent vision loss from amblyopia ("lazy eye") and other pediatric eye diseases can be prevented. But children at any age with signs and/or symptoms of vision problems, like red eyes, tearing eyes, unusual sensitivity to light, eye pain, or squinting should be examined as soon as possible.
http://www.netwellness.org/healthtopics/eye/children.cfm

FAQ for eye health- http://www.netwellness.org/healthtopics/eye/

No comments:

Post a Comment