How often does a person need an eye exam? It’s a good question that we get asked all the time, and at Vista Eye Care in Thornton, Colorado, our eye doctors recommend eye exams each year for all of our patients. Our annual comprehensive eye and vision examination includes a large number of tests that we perform quickly and efficiently. The result is an excellent overall portrait of your vision and eye health.
All of our comprehensive eye exams include measuring your existing prescription eyewear. We then measure your vision with that eyewear and determine your refractive error (nearsightedness, farsightedness, or astigmatism). We also measure your distance, up-close, and computer-distance vision, as well as evaluating your vision at your specific work/hobby distance (for example, crocheting is usually performed a bit closer than the traditional reading distance of 40cm). We check the functionality of the extraocular muscles, looking for strabismus (an eye turn), then we check pupil functionality, side vision, and the presence of a phoria or tropia (latent or constant eye turns). We measure the intraocular pressure as a screening for glaucoma, and then check the health of the eyelids, lashes, cornea, conjunctiva, sclera, inner lids, iris, lens, anterior chamber, and vitreous humor with the biomicroscope. We examine the back of the eyes looking at the arteries and veins at the back of the eye, the optic nerves, macula, and retinal health. A dilation is performed in those patients with a history of ocular disease or in those patients with moderate to severe nearsightedness (or those patients with a history of nearsightedness such as in those patients that have had corneal refractive surgery).
For our new patients, we evaluate color vision, previous ocular and medical history, family ocular and medical history, previous medical records, and a through baseline ocular health check.
In addition, we will perform extended testing as necessary for patients with high blood pressure, advanced color vision testing, and dry eye evaluation with various ophthalmic staining agents among others. For those patients being monitored for diabetic eye disease, hypertensive eye disease, or monitoring of systemic medications such as chloroquine, we will write a thorough report for your primary care physician, and make sure that you have a copy for your own medical records as well.
We recommend seeing children at 6 months of age, before they start school, and then each year after. This helps assure that the eyes are healthy and free to develop normally. A thorough infant eye exam allows our eye doctors to rule-out the presence of amblyopia (“lazy eye”), cataracts, or congenital glaucoma.
A comprehensive eye and vision exam with our optometrists is a very thorough check of your eye health and vision. Drs. Abert and Pedroza both believe strongly in preventing eye disease before it starts. We will provide you and your family with tips for ocular disease prevention, and make sure that your vision is comfortable for your home life and work. Of course, we pride ourselves on answering all of your questions, and our optometrists are always available via email to answer any concerns that arise with your eyes.
Please contact our office today to schedule your yearly eye and vision check-up!