A No-Nonsense Guide To Myopia In Children

Myopia is the clinical name for short-sightedness or nearsightedness. It refers to when a person’s vision is blurry for objects that are far away. Each person is different, some don’t suffer at all, others have varying degrees of blurriness. It often starts in childhood and slowly gets worse until they stop growing.

What causes Myopia

Myopia can be caused by a few reasons. 2 of the most popular ones are family history and lifestyle.

Family history

If your child has a parent who already suffers from short-sightedness then there is a good chance they will too. In fact, if they have 1 parent who suffers from Myopia they have nearly a 1 in 3 chance of suffering from Myopia as a child.

If both their parents suffer from Myopia then that chance increases to 1 in 2.

Even if both their parents are free from short-sightedness, there is still nearly a 1 in 4 chance they will suffer from myopia.

Lifestyle

Today’s modern family lifestyle has also been proven to affect your child’s chances of suffering from myopia. Nowadays children are generally spending less time outside. This increase the risk of your child developing short-sightedness. Also, the overuse of portable devices can speed up the development of short-sightedness, especially when used in low light conditions.

Understanding short-sightedness in children

As a simple explanation, for your child to see clearly, their eye needs to focus the light at the back of the eye, on the retina. this is the light-sensitive lining of their eye. If the light is focussed in front or behind the retina this causes blurry vision.

As your child grows, so do their eyes, and in a myopic eye, the eyeball grows too long. The result of this is the eye focusses the light in front of the retina instead of on it, causing the vision of distant objects to be blurry. And as your child continues to grow, this can become worse.

This, of course, has a defining impact on the child’s everyday life, especially at school. It can affect their learning if they are struggling to see the teacher and screens at the front of the class. this can also lead to future eye health problems. This is because the retina stretches as the eyeball grows and may become vulnerable in later life, problems may include retinal detachment and myopic maculopathy.

Slowing Down Myopia in Children

Myopia Control

Does your child suffer from Myopia?

The only true way to know if your child does suffer from short-sightedness is to have an eye exam at a local optician, but there are some possible signs you can look for.

• Does your child move closer to TV or other objects when looking?
• Are they underperforming at school?
• Do they suffer from headaches?
• Do they complain of tired eyes?
• Do you notice them squinting or screwing up their eyes to see?

It is also possible that they show no symptoms at all.

What to do about Myopia in your Child

Firstly book a professional eye exam. A qualified optometrist, such as Opticare’s optometrists can test and diagnose Myopia quickly and easily in children.

Children eye tests are free on the NHS, so you only need to find 20 minutes in your diary for what may make a huge difference for your son or daughter.

If your child is diagnosed with Myopia, you can discuss ways to tackle it with your optician. There are various options available depending on your lifestyle, circumstances and how serious it is.

Regularly wearing prescription glasses and contact lenses will help your child see clearly, but won’t slow down the progression of Myopia.

You also need to make sure you have your child re-tested regularly, as their prescription will probably change as they continue to grow. Your optician will advise you on how regular this should be.

If you do suspect your child may be suffering, then please do book them in to see us. The sooner this is diagnosed, the sooner they can begin to see clearly, both at school and home and it could make a huge difference to their future.