Should I Wear Progressives? Where Should I Buy Them

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Hi Everyone

I had cataract surgery a few months ago and it went well. I had Tecnis 1 monfocal in both eyes and I see distance 20/20 minus a few letters. However, my vision is sometimes blurry for a few second until my eyes focus and my cataract surgeon said that was due to my residual astigmatism. My intermediate is good enough to read the computer. My near vision is not good enough for sustained reading or small print. I told my cataract surgeon to to give me a prescription to sharpen up my distance vision and another for prescription readers. And they do really prove my near vision and improve my distance vision. However, when I wear either pair, my intermediate vision suffers. I can't wear either pair and see the computer well. I end up just looking the computer with no eyeglasses at all.

I may be taking a new job where I will have to read books and be on the computer a lot , plus move around a large office, I wonder if I should ask my cataract surgeon for a prescription for progressives or just juggle around with my two pairs of eyeglasses and take them off to use the computer? I got my glasses made at a nationwide optical chain and they didn't cost me that much. They said progressives would be around $175. What do you all think I should do?

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  • Posted

    I appreciate the replies of everyone. I drove to the library tonight to use this computer to type my message to you all with no eyeglasses. I am sitting under a very bright light at the library and I can read the print of a reference book fairly well also with no eyeglasses. Maybe my IOL eyes will work well enough in my new job so that I don't need my prescription readers or my distant single vision eyeglasses. And maybe no progressives either. I will see how it goes.

    A brightly lit room certainly makes a difference in how well you can see.

    • Posted

      Because IOL lenses have no accommodation (ability to change the power of the lens like a natural lens can) the only way the eye can improve vision is when the pupil closes down in bright light. Then you get a pinhole effect that sharpens the vision. It is quite normal for an IOL lens to lose visual acuity as the light level gets dimmer. I even find that when watching TV if the room is brightly lit I see a sharper image than when the TV is in a dark room. I suspect this is the pinhole benefit when the pupil closes down.

  • Posted

    Before I had my cataracts removed, I was myopic and I always wore progressive glasses. But I did a lot of computer work, so I had some single-vision glasses made that were optimized for computer monitor distance. Sure, I had to change glasses for computer work vs. everything else, but it worked very well for me. As others have noted, even if you have a good-sized intermediate zone in your progressive lenses, you are still moving your head around to find the sweet spot for reading on the monitor. And with today's huge monitors, that is a lot of area to look at.

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