Not always; it depends on your vision problems.

Once you enter your mid-forties, you’ll probably develop presbyopia (ageing of the eye that makes it hard to read things up close). This is aside from whatever refractive error you have!

If your problem is seeing things in the distance, and you have both eyes corrected for this, it means you’ll still need reading glasses to read things close to you.

Monovision

Monovision may be an option- this means that one eye is corrected for distance vision, so you can see far away, and the other eye is either corrected for near vision or in some cases, left in its natural state.

It may work for certain patients but it is entirely due to that patient’s eye issues and age.

When it does work, it means that reliance on glasses for both distances is done away with. However, having two eyes focussing together and corrected for the same distance is what gives us binocular vision and gives critical depth perception.

Monovision does not work for everyone, some people will be aware of visual confusion as the eyes are focused at different distances and / or that judgement of depth is impaired.

This is an important consideration for those people for whom critical depth perception is required in their occupation or hobbies. Often a trial with contact lenses to simulate monovision will be offered and patients can assess for themselves how comfortable they are.

Also, bear in mind that Monovison may work better for early presbyopes with lower reading prescriptions, so even if it works initially it probably won’t work over time.

Optilase offer two different solutions to people with presbyopia, designed to specifically address the condition, which is age related and not a problem with your corneas, called Presbia and KAMRA.

To find out more, call Optilase on +353 1 223 8821 or enter your details in the consultation form and we'll call you.