Major Vision Problems
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Myopia
Strange as it seems, being nearsighted means you can't see things far away. The usual problem stems from your eyeball being too long, or your cornea being too curved. When your eyeballs have this problem the focal points wind up in front of the retina where, when light reaches it, blurred images scatter.
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Hyperopia
Farsighted means you can't see things near. Why? The cornea does not have enough curve or you have a short eyeball. Tough luck. In this situation the focal point rests behind the retina. When light enters the retina, blurring again takes place because the images should have been focused before getting to the retina, not after.
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Astigmatig
If you suffer astigmatism chances are your eyeballs have a football-like shape when they should be more spherical. Instead of focusing on one point, light entering the eye focuses on several and you get blurring images.
You can be both astigmatic and near-sighted or far-sighted, the latter requiring bi-focals. Most people address these problems with corrective lenses—glasses or contacts—but laser surgery can allow you the opportunity to see without glasses if you are nearsighted or astigmatic. One laser device has been approved for use to correct farsightedness, but less research exists on the results in farsighted people.
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Presbyopia
Among the 40-and-older crowd, it's a rare individual who doesn't need some visual enhancements, even if they're just off-the-rack reading glasses from the drug store. Farsighted folks (hyperopes) suddenly find that they need longer arms to read the newspaper or a restaurant menu. Nearsighted folks (myopes) may be removing their glasses more frequently to read things up close.
The increasing difficulty most of us experience as we age is due to a condition known as presbyopia. The effects of presbyopia make us increasingly farsighted as we get older. |
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