Mila Kunis
This famous television and movie actress is blind in one eye due to chronic iritis (a condition of inflammation of the uvea/ iris (the coloured part of your eye). Causes of this condition are uncertain, however, it is usually linked to risks such as injury to the eye, infections, genetic predisposition, sarcoidosis, and even certain medications.

Judith Dench
Judith Dench is known for her starring roles as Queen Victoria in Mrs. Brown and M in the James Bond films. Throughout her huge roles and successful career, she developed age related macular degeneration, a condition that causes vision loss related to the deterioration of a portion of the retina (the macula).

Bono
You might not know it because he’s always hiding behind sunglasses, but lead singer of the popular band U2 has been living with glaucoma for the past 20 years. He wears his sunglasses almost everywhere to help with the light and glare sensitivity caused by the condition.

Whoopi Goldberg
Beloved actress and co-host of ‘The View’, Whoopi Goldberg developed glaucoma as she aged. She has stated in many instances that she suffers from painful headaches and pressure in the eye due to this condition.

Brittany Howard
Brittany Howard, lead singer of Alabama Shakes, became blind in one eye due to the eye cancer called retinoblastoma. She overcame this disease, and did not allow her partial blindness to affect her incredible career and winning 3 GRAMMYs.

When it comes to being diagnosed with eye conditions, you aren’t alone. This list of celebrities shows that even those of us that seem untouchable can be affected by vision and eye health issues. Regardless of their condition, their continued success shows that it doesn’t have to stop anyone from living an exciting and fulfilling life. If you would like to visit an expert optometrist for an eye exam, visit us at Dr. D’Orio Eye Care. Call or use our website form to book an appointment: 416.661.5555 (North York location) or 416.656.2020 (Toronto location).

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Causes

Dry eyes occur when tears are not able to provide adequate lubrication for your eyes either because they do not produce enough of them or because they are of poor quality. Dry eyes is often caused by dry environments, computer use, reading, schoolwork, and other close viewing situations that require focus for lengthy periods of time.  In this way, you may only experience dry eyes in certain situations/ environments such as on airplanes, in air-conditioned rooms, riding bikes, or looking at screens. 

Different things cause different dry eye symptoms. Environmental stressors such as wind, smoke, and dry air can be causes of increased tear evaporation whereas decreased or poor quality tear production can be caused by aging, medical conditions, side effects of medications, and/or tear duct damage from inflammation. 

Effects

If you experience dry eyes, you may feel:

–      Discomfort

–      Stinging or burning sensations

–      Stringy mucus in or around your eyes

–      Sensitivity to light

–      Eye redness

–      Sensation of having something in your eyes

–      Difficulty wearing contact lenses

–      Difficulty driving at night

–      Watery eyes (the body’s response to irritation of dry eyes, different from tear production)

–      Blurred vision or eye fatigue

–      Itchy eyes

–      Heavy eyes

–      Sore eyes

Prevention

You can prevent the symptoms of dry eyes by:

–      Avoid air blowing into your eyes

–      Adding moisture to the air

–      Wearing wraparound sunglasses or other protective eyewear

–      Taking breaks during long, focused tasks

–      Being aware of your environment

–      Positioning your computer screen below eye level

–      Stop smoking and avoid smoke

–      Use artificial tears regularly

When To See a Doctor

See a doctor if you are suffering from these dry eye symptoms and experiencing extreme discomfort and pain. Your optometrist can help you determine the best way to fix your dry eye problem and/or refer you to a specialist if necessary. 

Don’t struggle through the discomfort of dry eyes. This article and your optometrist can help you understand the condition better in order to get appropriate treatment. If you are looking for an Eye Clinic that prioritizes eye health, call us at one of our locations to book an appointment and we’ll be happy to assist you. 

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Contacts are awesome, but anyone who’s worn them, knows that they can cause problems, like redness and eye pain. But the most serious problem is something called “Microbial Keratitis,” which is an infection of the cornea. The cornea is the clear layer that is considered the transparent window of the eyeball.  And if it gets infected it can sometimes lead to blindness. Lots of different germs can cause keratitis: bacteria, fungi, viruses like herpes, and even amoeba. The interesting thing is that the species of fungi, amoeba, and bacteria that cause the disease are actually found all over the place. Literally. For example, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which is the most common keratitis-causing bacteria, is actually found in tap water and on the lettuce in your fridge! But if these bugs are so prevalent, why aren’t we constantly getting infections?

Great question. Well, because our eyes are really important for our survival, we’ve developed lightning quick defenses to kill most germs that land there. In fact, these defenses are so good that by studying the eye, scientists are starting to learn some secrets for keeping other parts of our body pathogen-free. The problem is that these super prevalent microbes are super prevalent because they’re awesome at adapting to new situations.

So when you trap them against your eye with a contact lens for hours on end, you could essentially be selecting for bugs that can survive this really harsh environment. The few that make it actually like it there and keep on replicating. To make matters worse, when you remove your lenses and leave them to soak, you may be selecting for bugs that can survive antimicrobial solutions, as well! Eventually, these superbugs might start eating their way through your cornea.

If you feel any discomfort in your eye, like if it feels like there’s something stuck in there even after you take out your lenses and that feeling just seems to get worse, keep those lenses out of your eyes and let your doctor know. If you wait too long, your body’s inflammatory response can kick in, which can cause its own damage. In fact, it’s sometimes the inflammation, and not the amoeba or bacteria, that finally causes blindness.

Keratitis only affects about 0.2% of people who wear contact lenses on an extended basis. But for those who get it, it can be extremely serious, so scientists are studying how to prevent it altogether. But in the meantime, if you’re a contact lens wearer, what can you do to prevent keratitis?

Well, it’s not foolproof, but wearing the type of lenses you throw out at the end of each day could help. And of course follow your doctor’s instructions.

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In this final blog of our dry eye series we will focus on the Scleral Lens, which is very beneficial in combatting severe dry eye. This lens is larger and more rigid compared to the conventional contact lens. Its unique formation covers the entire cornea which prevent it from moving out of place when the wearer blinks. One of the most significant benefits of this specialized lens is its ability to combat dry eye. This is due to its unique shape, which creates extra space between the back of the contact lens and the cornea. This space which acts as a reservoir for saline solution is extremely important in preventing dry eye.

Another important benefit of the Scleral Lens is that it is helpful in treating people with a progressive eye disease called Keratoconus. Although this condition occurs mostly with young adults, it has been found in people of all ages. Keratoconus affects one or both eyes by thinning and weakening the cornea. This thinning makes it flimsy and creates a bulge or a cone shape. This irregular formation causes nearsightedness and irregular astigmatism to develop, and eventually without treatment, distorted blurred vision and glare and light sensitivity will occur. The unique shape of the Scleral lens accommodates the sufferers of Keratoconus by providing a uniform surface like that of a healthy normal cornea. Keratoconus is hereditary, so if a family member has it, you are advised to have your eyes checked out as soon as possible.

Scleral Lens technology is advancing rapidly and manufacturers are designing them to correct more vision problems than ever before. Our doctors at our Finch and St. Clair offices will be more than happy to explain the benefits of these lenses. Come in and inquire about the Scleral lens the next time you’re here for a visit.

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Did you know that blood pressure is the force of pressure against the blood vessel walls, and not the speed at which blood flows through your arteries and veins? Did you also know that high blood pressure leads to Hypertensive retinopathy, an eye disease that has no symptoms but is easily detected during a routine eye exam? It’s a scary thought when something as serious as high blood pressure which causes life threatening conditions like aneurysms (bulging of your artery), heart attacks, strokes and kidney failure, have no symptoms.

The causes of high blood pressure are still unknown, but known factors do contribute to its development:

– Smoking

– Being overweight

– Consuming too much salt

– Being physically inactive

– Consumption of too much alcohol

– Stress

– Older age

– Genetics

– Adrenal and thyroid disorders

– Sleep apnea

It seems like anyone can have high blood pressure. You don’t need to be overweight, nor do you have to consume unhealthy amounts of salt or even be a smoker. You can be fit and have problems sleeping. You can be at an age where the chances of having high blood pressure are more common. Your high blood pressure could be hereditary. Or you could just be under a lot of stress.

Did you also know that your optometrists can check for high blood pressure? They’ll use a special instrument called an ophthalmoscope to check the back of your eyeball for narrowed blood vessels, spotting of the retina, any type of discharge, swelling of the retina and optic nerve and any kind of bleeding.

We are all at risk, regardless of our health, which is why we should come in and have ourselves checked out. See your health care provider or your eye doctor before its too late. Do it today!

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These symptoms are the result of the over production of otherwise normally occurring bacteria that live along the margins of the eyelid and eyelash area. This overgrowth of bacteria spawns a biofilm that is the perfect environment for the Demodex mite, which produces exotoxins that damage tear glands and prevent them from actively creating healthy tears – which help to maintain the health of the eyelid and eyelash area.

The process of cleaning with the Blephex machine is painless and quite simple – the ophthalmologists glides the clinical grade sponge along the eye lid and lash line. This procedure removes the biofilm which the Demodex Mite use as a food source. This brief procedure brings immediate relief and the production of healthy tears is initiated. The beneficial effects of cleaning your eyelid and eyelash area are much like visiting your dentist to maintain healthy teeth. By having your eyelids cleaned regularly, this ensures that Blepharitis will be stopped from returning and that your tear glands will actively continue to make healthy tears, thus avoiding Dry Eye Disease.

Our location at St. Clair is fully equipped to check for Dry Eye Disease. Contact us before this becomes a problem that could have been prevented.

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Tear Lab’s simple and painless procedure involves taking a tear sample no larger than the size of the period at the end of this sentence. After the samples have been taken from both eyes, the ophthalmologists will determine the level of osmolarity in the tear samples. Salt levels are then charted which help to further diagnose your dry eye problem. As indicated in the previous blog, DED is not a symptom but a disease that must be taken seriously. Only early diagnosis and treatment of this disease can prevent more immediate and severe problems.

If you have any of the following signs, call us to book an appointment so that we can give you a full workup to check your eyes for Dry Eye Disease.

• Blurry vision

• Redness

• Burning

• Itching

• Light sensitivity

• Excessive tearing / watery eyes

• Tired eyes / eye fatigue

• Stringy mucous in or around the eyes

• Foreign body sensation

• Contact lens discomfort

• Scratchy, feeling of sand or grit in eye

• Our location at St. Clair is fully equipped to check for Dry Eye Disease. Contact us before this becomes a problem that could have been prevented.

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There are two main factors that help determine your eye color: the amount and pattern of dark brown pigment (called melanin) in the part of your eye called the iris and the way in which the iris scatters light that passes through the eye.

The most important factor is pigment, which is determined by your genes.

WHY ARE YOUR GENES IMPORTANT?

Your genes determine your eye color by dictating how much (and where) melanin is produced in your iris. The more melanin produced, the darker the eye color will be. Because melanin production does not begin at birth, babies’ eyes appear blue. True eye colour will be determined over time. It’s usually not until age three that a child’s true permanent eye colour reveals itself.

People with common brown eyes have a large amount of melanin in their iris, while people with blue eyes have much less of this pigment. The rarest eye colour is green. Approximately 2% of the world’s population have green coloured eyes.

Have you ever noticed how some people’s eyes seem to change color depending upon the lighting?

That occurs because the iris has two layers. Sometimes there is pigment in both layers. In people with blue or green eyes, however, the front layer will have very little or no melanin. Depending upon the amount and diffraction of light, their eyes may appear to change colors.

In more rare instances, some people may have two different colour eyes. These results from a condition called heterochromia. It’s very rare, but usually harmless. It occurs due to differences in the early stages of iris development.

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One of the most common problems that many optometrists face in their interactions with patients is the problem of DED – a disease that affects a large part of the population in North America. As you age, your chances of getting DED increase. Women are twice as likely to suffer from this disease over men. Many cases of Dry eye Disease go undiagnosed because many people downgrade the seriousness of this problem to a symptom. Unfortunately this lack of understanding of the severity of this disease decreases the importance of early diagnosis and treatment, which if left untreated can progress to chronic ocular surface disease, a serious eye condition that greatly affects vision and quality of life.

We understand the severity of this disease, which means that we won’t prescribe eye drops to ‘quick fix’ this very common and misunderstood problem. If you are experiencing any of the problems that are mentioned in this message then contact us for a full workup so that we can determine if dry eyes is the primary problem or if it is a secondary problem that might lead to more severe issues. The following is the full workup that we implement to determine the cause of dry eyes:

• A survey to help score your level of dryness.

• A tear lab, which measures osmolarity (the salt content of your tears).

• Inflammase test to check for inflammation.

• Phenol red test to measure the amount of tears that a patient is producing.

• A visual examination via a microscope by your optometrist.

• All of this data is used to determine if the patient needs a course of products.

Our location at St. Clair is fully equipped to check for Dry Eye Disease. Contact us before this becomes a problem that could have been prevented.

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We all know what happens when you get older; your body begins to break down. This is especially true when it comes to your vision.

There is a bright side…. By engaging in a healthy active lifestyle, you can delay these problems from really impacting your life. But, it is also important to be aware and conscious of what these common vision problems can do to you later in life.

1. Age Related Macular Degeneration

Age Related Muscular Degeneration or (AMD) is the leading cause of severe vision loss in those over 50, and results in the loss of central vision. Symptoms include the gradual loss of ability to see objects clearly; distortion of objects and shapes; loss of clear color vision, and a dark or empty area in the center of vision.

2. Blepharitis

This disease is an inflammation or infection of the eyelid, and it can lead to similar symptoms as dry eye. Some symptoms include: irritated, itchy eyelids and the formation of dandruff-like scales on the eyelashes. Although it can be uncomfortable to deal with, it’s not usually contagious and doesn’t generally lead to vision damage.

3. Cataracts

This disease is very dangerous. A cataract is a cloudy or opaque area in the lens of the eye that can interfere with vision. They are most commonly found in older adults, and they are the most common cause of blindness.

According to Prevent Blindness America, about 24.5 million U.S. adults over 40 have cataracts. Symptoms include blurred or hazy vision, increased difficulty seeing at night, increased sensitivity to glare and reduced intensity of colors.

4. Glaucoma

The second-leading cause of blindness is glaucoma. Glaucoma is actually comprised of a group of eye disorders. These disorders cause progressive damage to the optic nerve, ultimately resulting in loss of vision.

It is most common in people over the age of 40. The AOA recommends an annual eye exam for anyone at high risk for glaucoma: older adults, especially African-Americans and those with a family history of glaucoma.

5. Diabetic Retinopathy

Seniors are more likely to suffer from diabetes, and thus can be affected by diabetic retinopathy. It causes progressive damage to the retina, the light-sensitive lining at the back of your eye. Diabetic retinopathy is a serious sight-threatening complication rooted in diabetes.

Preventing Senior Vision Problems

Seniors can be proactive by simply eating a nutritious diet filled with plenty of leafy green vegetables, and by striving to keep blood pressure and diabetes under control.

Those in a higher risk group for vision problems may want to consider antioxidant supplements and eye health vitamins – the ones suggested by the California Optometric Association include: lutein and zeaxanthin, essential fatty acids, vitamins C and E, and zinc. These supplements will help strengthen your eyes.

For those who already suffering from vision loss, low-vision aids and devices can help, like CCTV and magnifiers. Our team of doctors are more than happy to help recommend you the right treatment for any of your vision problems.

Feel free to call usif you believe one of your loved ones may be suffering from some of these common age related vision problems. We would love to help.

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