Eye Examination

Why should I have an eye examination?

Eye examinations are important because more than 80% of the information you take in is visual.  That means if you aren’t seeing as well as you should be then you are potentially missing out on quite a lot.

Also could you imagine not being able to see?  That is a very important reason why regular eye health examination are important.  We want to pickup small issues before they become big problems later.

The worst time to pickup an eye problem is when you have had it for many years.  Prevention is better than any cure and many eye conditions can be treated if picked up early.

What are the things that are checked during an eye examination?

The two major things we do during an eye examination is to measure your vision checking for refractive errors such as short sightedness (myopia) long sightedness (hyperopia) and astigmatism.  The second is to check your eye health in detail with our slit lamp microscope, retinal camera and other high tech devices.

How often should I have an eye examination?

As a general rule of thumb about every 2 years is a good schedule for eye examination.  However if your eyes are changing or if we want to monitor any small issues with your vision we would recommend seeing you more often, sometimes every 6 or 12 months.

For children we often see them about every 6 months if their eyes are changing or 12 months for those who are not.

For older people with eye diseases such as macula degeneration or glaucoma the review period can be much shorter than this.  If you notice any small changes to your vision we want to see you as soon as possible so we can determine if you need a referral to see an eye specialist, or if it is something we can help with.