The need for reading glasses is a common problem for middle-aged and older people. This condition, called presbyopia, is a universal dioptric deficiency affecting everyone over the age of 45. Up to the age of 40 – 45, the eye’s lens has enough elasticity to change its shape and thus even its optic bulk depending on the distance of the observed object. As the eyes age, lens elasticity diminishes and the person loses the ability to focus on nearby objects. There are a number of ways of dealing with this deficiency.

People who see well at distances or those that need glasses to see at distances must use dioptric plus spectacles for reading in presbyopic ages. People with a low level of short-sightedness (-2 to -5 D) often only need to remove their long-sighted spectacles. People who are highly short-sighted need reading glasses with a lower minus correction. Bifocal, trifocal and multifocal spectacles are suitable for cases where changing spectacles often would be annoying (teachers, salespeople etc.). A number of people won’t give up their bifocals, others dislike the image’s “jump” as it transfers to the individual segments and the reversed need for seeing during certain tasks (when walking down stairs it is difficult to differentiate the stairs through the segment for nearby objects). Good quality, well-made multifocal spectacles, give relatively comfortable vision at all distances. Some people dislike the narrower field of vision and peripheral distortions.

Monovision is a state which can be achieved through contact lenses or some refractive surgery treatments. If the patient is short-sighted at two or less dioptres, it is possible to focus one eye to distance by a treatment (removing dioptres) and the other eye to leave focussed on nearby objects. For people with a higher number of dioptres, we correct one eye to distance (to zero), the other eye is purposefully under-corrected to enable nearby objects to be seen. Anybody who is considering having such a solution can try out a simulation of this state with contact lenses. The contact lens fully corrects one eye, the second eye has a contact lens that is one or two dioptres weaker. We can proceed similarly for long-sighted patients with the difference that the reading eye must be one or two dioptres over-corrected. All active people for whom changing spectacles all the time is a technical or aesthetic problem usually appreciate Monovision. If you feel that you are a good example of someone who would like to solve the problem of presbyobia with monovision, ask our doctors about it during your examination.