Improve Focus by Identifying and Treating Astigmatism

A healthy eye lens (cornea) is rounded to filter light in and provide focused vision. As light enters the cornea of an imperfect eye, one with astigmatism, it isn’t able to provide the same kind of focus. The imperfect lens usually has some type of defect, like having a flat area that doesn’t allow it to reflect light.

Astigmatism is a fairly common condition. In fact, most people have an astigmatism to some degree, but for most people it is not severe enough to interfere with their vision. It often accompanies either farsightedness or nearsightedness, causing a refractive error. Severe curvature of flat parts of the cornea most likely need to be repaired to establish clear vision.

A routine eye exam is necessary to detect astigmatisms and come up with a solution to solve the issue. This is especially important for kids, whose astigmatisms aren’t usually found until they are school aged and having trouble learning due to and reading problems, trouble reading the board and squinting to make sense of the work.

Common symptoms of astigmatisms include:

• Blurred distance vision
• Squinting
• Eye strain
• Fatigue
• Sensitivity to light
• Headaches

Treatment for astigmatism is generally the use of glasses or corrective lenses, which have come a long way in recent years. The other option is to have surgery to either repair the natural lens or replace it with an artificial one.

There isn’t a known cause at this point, but a majority of astigmatisms are present at birth, leading to the belief that it is genetic.