What You Need To Know About Myopia Control In Children

Myopia affects more than just the need for glasses to correct blurry vision.

Children frequently experience myopia progression, which lowers their quality of life and increases risks to their eye health. Myopia control treatments are now able to improve children’s vision and promote long-term eye health. Read on to find out more!

What is Myopia?

People with myopia have blurred vision when looking at objects from a distance. When myopia worsens, the blur can become noticeable even when the object is close to or at arm’s length. Near-sightedness or short-sightedness are other names for it.

Myopia usually begins to develop between the ages of 6 and 14 and generally becomes progressively worse every several months in children. It results from the eyes’ rapid and excessive expansion relative to the usual pace of eye growth. The eyes should continue to expand consistently in size until adolescence, then stabilize. However, with myopia, the eyes develop too quickly, causing rapid and continuous vision loss as well as ongoing eye growth into adolescence and even early adulthood. Myopia progression is the term used to describe this continuing deterioration.

What is Myopia Control?

The use of treatments intended to stop the advancement of myopia is known as “myopia control.” These treatments include atropine eye drops, soft contact lenses, ortho-k, and special types of glasses. Myopia control is especially crucial for children, as it is in this age group that myopia is most likely to progress or worsen quickly.

Both myopia management and myopia control are phrases used to refer to the additional clinical care needed for myopic children and adults. Myopia control typically entails using eye drops, contacts, or glasses to stop the progression of myopia. Myopia control is a broad term that encompasses maintaining eye health as well as various lifestyle and environmental factors that may contribute to the advancement of myopia.

What are The Advantages of Myopia Control?

The primary advantage of treating myopia is to reduce the risks associated with high myopia. Those with high degrees of myopia will have increased risk for diseases such as glaucoma, retinal detachments, and myopic maculopathy.

Myopia requires the use of spectacles or contact lenses to treat blurry distance vision. If your myopia is lower, you will be more functional in the mornings before putting on your contacts or glasses. You’ll be able to work a little better without them as opposed to becoming totally incapacitated without them.

Additionally, a lower prescription increases the likelihood that your child will be a good candidate for laser eye surgery as an adult to correct their myopia, as well as the likelihood that they will have better visual results after surgery.

What Else Should I know?

Numerous studies have demonstrated that a child’s or teen’s visual environment can raise their chances of developing and progressing myopia. When creating the visual environment, do increase the duration of outdoor time your child has. Talk to your eye doctor or optometrist about the ideal duration they should spend outdoors and on screens and/or reading to control your child’s myopia. These can play a significant role in ensuring the optimum results from myopia control treatments.

Let Treehouse Eyes Help Your Child Manage Myopia

Treehouse Eyes’ doctors use modern equipment to develop personalized treatment plans for your child. Our treatment plans include special prescription eye drops and customized daytime and overnight contact lenses. Treehouse Eyes doctors determine which treatment plan works the best for your child at your initial consultation. Schedule a consultation now to find out more.