Eyedrops to Replace Reading Glasses
CAN EYEDROPS REPLACE YOUR reading glasses? The United States Food and Drug Administration recently approved the first eye drop to improve age-related near-vision. Let’s take a quick look at the safety and effectiveness of this “into the future” approach to vision improvement.
With aging, our eyes’ lenses lose their elasticity. The lens begins to have challenges with becoming more rounded and we then get a condition known as presbyopia.
Presbyopia typically begins after age 40. I began to have trouble focusing on objects at reading distance. The focusing power of my eyes for reading worsened progressively over time. For many, this degradation in near-vision is complete by age 65 years.
The scope of the problem of presbyopia is huge — the condition affects nearly 80 percent of those ages 45 to 55 in North America. An eye doctor can diagnose it with a basic eye exam.
There are approximately 1.8 billion individuals worldwide with presbyopia. Where I live (the United States), presbyopia is the most common cause of visual problems, due to the aging of the “baby boomer” generation born between 1946 and 1964.
