Stay Ahead of Age-related Eye Health Issues
When your vision is good and your eyes feel fine, it might seem like there’s no reason to see an eye doctor. For people 65 and over, that’s not the case.
“This is a big misconception,” stated optometrist Dr. Mark Langer. He said a lot of the major eye conditions that can cause significant vision loss later in life don’t present with any pain or loss of sight.
There are no pain receptors in the retina. “For a lot of these ocular diseases, there’s going to be no initial symptoms and no initial vision changes,” explained Dr. Langer. Because there is no pain involved with retinal conditions like macular degeneration and glaucoma at first, the only way to identify them properly is to have routine eye exams with your optometrist.
Dr. Langer is with IRIS Optometrists and Opticians and said there have been many times he’s seen someone with a debilitating eye problem and wished it’d been caught 10 years earlier. Many people put off their eye exams because they feel like their vision isn’t changing and have no concerns.