What Are Custom Contact Lenses?
Custom contact lenses are created especially for you and precisely fit your eyes. These are mainly applied when conventional contact lenses are irritating you and cause discomfort every time you use them. These are extremely convenient if you have astigmatism in your eyes.
In custom contact lenses, special effect contact lenses have recently gained enormous popularity. These cosmetic lenses give the wearer’s eyes a unique desired effect and color. These kinds of lenses are commonly known as costume lenses, decorative lenses, or Plano lenses.
Why are they being used?
Custom-colored contact lenses have become very trendy lately as they are custom-tailored to your desire. They have become an essential element of costume parties; theatre plays and cosplays. They are available almost in every color from vibrant to dull and dark color and can change the color of your eyes for fun. With your eyes you could be a behemoth or a spirit or anything you want to be, consequently, the custom contact lenses are commonly known as gothic contact lenses, theatrical or costume contacts.
What is harmful about custom contact lenses?
Wearing custom contact lenses is no danger to use if used with caution and care. Professional guidance from an ophthalmologist or an optometrist is needed for the prescription of your custom contact lenses. Buying these from general markets, bargain shops or makeup stores brings home menacing outcomes only. It is to be made sure that each pair of lenses is replaced every year, regardless of how much they have been used in the previous year.
Disregarding these protective measures accompanies certain irrevocable injuries to eyes like corneal abrasions(scratches), keratitis (corneal ulcers), watering from eyes, pain in eyes, grittiness (foreign body sensation) in eyes, diminished vision, and even blindness.
Natural flora resides in human bodies in harmony. Custom contact lenses are a foreign object for your body, being careless in their use can give chances to microbial flora to thrive. Microorganisms like Pseudomonas, Bacillus thuringiensis, Enterobacter species, and Klebsiella pneumonia are notorious. It is either this microbial contamination and eating away of the cornea by bacteria or hypoxia (suffocating) of the cornea caused by certain chemicals used in making custom contact lenses.
According to licensed practitioners’ experiences, buying these custom contact lenses illegally without a prescription from unlicensed stores is the ultimate pitfall. They highly condemn such activities as ocular complications are peaking due to this. It is simply an illegal act. A legal prescription requires the brand name, the lens parameters, and the power of the lens. Contact lenses are medical devices and must be prescribed by licensed practitioners.
In an online survey, twenty-two optometrists took part, 70% of them had attended patients with ocular complications arising from wearing custom contact lenses. 72% of sellers of these decorative lenses did not meet the criterion of FTC and FDA regulations1. There is a dire need to educate people about unauthorized sellers and the adverse outcomes of unsafe practices while using custom contact lenses. This practice of selling unauthorized custom contact lenses without a prescription is illegal in the US.
How to correctly use custom contact lenses?
● Get yourself a prescription for a custom eye contact lens from a licensed Practitioner.
● Buy your lens from an authentic source with your prescription.
● Make sure to follow the right hygiene steps to clean your contact lenses
● Use only the recommended solutions for cleaning your custom contact lenses, not tap water or salt solution for rinsing. Discard the solution after one month of opening its seal.
● Wash your hands before applying
● Apply contact lenses as prescribed
How not to use custom contact lenses?
● Being slothful about cleaning your lens or lens solution.
● Sharing your custom contact lenses
● Being casual about symptoms in your eyes after wearing cosmetic contact lenses.
● Wearing your custom contact lenses over your prescription contact lenses.
● Making sure that you do not suffer from any infectious eye disease
● Not discarding these on the indicated date or after one year of first use.
● Continuing to use lenses if your eyes are itchy and bothersome.
● Rubbing your eyes violently while wearing lenses.
● Exposing your lenses to undue heat.
● Allowing make-up to come in contact with your lens.
● Sleeping with lenses
REFERENCES
1.Gaiser, Hilary O.D.; Ho, Connie O.D.; Janier, Nicole O.D.; Wee, Amy O.D.; Johnson, Catherine O.D.; Watanabe, Ronald O.D. Practitioner Perceptions of Patients Wearing Decorative Contact Lenses Purchased Through Unauthorized Sellers. Eye & Contact Lens: Science & Clinical Practice: March 2017 - Volume 43 - Issue 2 - p 135-139 doi: 10.1097/ICL.0000000000000240
