Contact lenses - what age?

[Bonsoir]

DD is 9 and wants to try contact lenses. Has anyone's child managed contact lenses at this age?

Assuming the astronomically unlikely case of your Western-world tap water being contaminated with eye-eating amoeba: If your hands are infected with this amoeba after washing with tap water, do you really think the simple act of drying them on a towel will disinfect them?

Cote - no, that doesn't always happen with hard lenses - friend who had them found that they could disappear off into the corners of their eye (god alone knows how) and would need to be poked back. Mine were soft, as I said, so apart from the eye flooding incident, I never had the issue - but they certainly did.

I always dried my hands before touching the lenses, but would squirt saline solution onto my fingers if necessary.

I started contacts at ten and they changed my life! No dailies then either, so more hassle with cleaning etc.

If your dd is responsible and you can afford it, deffo go for dailies ASAP.

I buy from Getlenses.co.uk or poss .com and its cheap - only about £10 a month and so worth it

I think maybe it's not just a safety thing with the water - water bloody hurts if it gets in your eye as well, so one would assume they're trying to save you from unnecessary pain as much as from infection, as your eyes could get inflamed from being sore.

I had to stop wearing my soft lenses daily when I was in my mid-late 30s, so 20 years after I started wearing them, because my left eye had reduced tolerance to them - started to itch and be sore after about 6h, where I'd been used to wearing them for up to 16 without problem. I gave up wearing them before I had to, iyswim. But since then, I've only worn them a couple of times and in fact now have no in-date daily lenses at all and probably won't bother getting any as I would wear them so rarely.

Corus - As I have mentioned earlier, I have been handling my lenses twice a day for significantly longer than 30 years. And I have never been given the instruction to dry my hands after washing them, by any of the ophthalmologists I have seen over the years. I realise that this is a new thing, following one unfortunate woman's infection with water from a dirty jacuzzi IIRC, but there is no logic to it.

If water is infected, then tapping your hands dry with a towel will not disinfect them. It can't. Drying your hands on a towel takes away the moisture but it cannot sterilise your skin.

When you next see your ophthalmologist, do ask him about this. I'd be interested to hear his answer, if he has one.

I have been wearing contact lenses for 30 years and the advice has ALWAYS been not to let water onto them because of acanthamoeba. It is most definitely not new advice. I dry my hands (yes I know that does not render them sterile) and then give the lenses a good rub and squirt with fresh solution to get rid of any towel fibres before they go in.

DS (just 13) started to try daily disposables a couple of months ago. According to the hospital ophthalmologist he could have started about a year earlier but he had no need to.
DS really couldn't get on with them at all, he struggled putting them in, taking them out and hated the feel of them in his eyes. He tried 6 or 7 times with help at home plus the first few times in the contact lens clinic.

We reluctantly decided to give up on them but have kept them in the cupboard as they have another 3-4yrs life so he can try again in time for next years ski season.

It doesn't bother me Corus, and there's no need to get cross

I started wearing contact lenses in the '70s, so yes, '90s are rather recent in comparison. I only heard about it in the '00s, from a friend (not a doctor).

All I'm saying is that it doesn't make sense to expect a simple patting on a towel to disinfect your hands. If you think I'm wrong, please correct me. If you agree, please ask your doctor about it, as of be interested in his reply. That's all.

Maybe you actually do have this amoeba in your tap water in the UK. Does everyone know not to rub their eyes with wet hand (or at all, really, since drying doesn't disinfect them), or is it only contact lens users who know about this?

Acanthamoeba keratitis and UK tap water
Acanthamoeba infections in contact lens wearers dependent on disinfection solutions
www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Contact-Lens-Problems.htm - I am particularly at the ~80% of CL wearers are unaware of the possible risks!!
www.journalofoptometry.org/en/how-could-contact-lens-wearers/articulo/13188766/

It's the fact that the acanthamoeba organisms like to attach themselves to the lens that is the problem. Once attached, they're there, sitting in your eye, waiting for the opportunity (slight corneal scratch etc.) to enter the body. Showering/swimming etc with contacts in allows water contact with the lens, which has a high affinity for the organism. Getting water in your eye without the organism trap is infinitely less likely to cause a problem, unless there is an open wound in the cornea - and you'd like to think that no one in their right minds would actually go swimming or stick their open eye in water with one of those.

Eek! Remind me never to live in the UK

How is drying the hands going to disinfect them, though? If hands are infected with this amoeba after washing, tapping with a towel is hardly going to kill them.

Interesting that one of those studies is saying that daily disposables are associated with increased risk. I wonder why.

It explains why, Cote - it's because some people use daily disposables more than once (cost saving) and therefore don't employ the same cleaning routine they would do as with longer term lenses.

Also, amoeba are not bacteria - chances are that if you remove the water by drying then the amoeba are likely to fall off too, as they don't have the klingon affinity for human skin that they do for contact lenses. But, rinsing your fingers with appropriate saline solution is also likely to remove any amoeba or trophozoites, so that's probably better than drying as it removes the risk of fluff and/or fibres.

As an aside, and bizarrely, we had a news item last night here about a lady who has been blinded and suffered brain damage from Acanthamoeba keratitis due to contact lens wearing - amazing timing!

I used to work in an optician and as long as you think she is mature enough to always take them out/put them in hygienically then there is no reason not to.

I actually saw children younger than 9 be more grown up about contacts about some adults - full grown men were always the biggest babies.

It might be worth looking at Ortho-K lenses as an option. I've recently got these and think they are amazing. You put them in at night, take them out in the morning and have great vision all day - there are various points in their favour including the fact that it's harder to wear them for too long, you won't have any worries about swimming or them coming out at school etc.

my nephew started wearing them at 7 for all the sport he did. he's still wearing them now aged 16 :)

Dd1 started wearing them just before she was 10 (we were going skiing I knew she'd enjoy it more if she could see well). DS didn't get on with them at all at 11 and hasn't tried them since. Dd2 started wearing them at 11. Both girls started off with daily disposables & only wearing them a few days a week. Dd1 switched to lenses she wears 5 or 6 days a week for two weeks & then a new pair when she was about 12.

Great article on children and contact lenses here: www.feelgoodcontacts.com/eye-care-hub/at-what-age-can-my-child-wear-contacts

Just make sure he follows good hand hygiene practices when inserting and removing contact lenses. I also suggest opting for daily disposables so they don't have to follow a daily cleaning and storing routine.

I started at 16 and have worn them since (now mid 30s). I would say if someone starts early, wear them only when necessary. I suffer from recurrent eye infections now saw an eye specialist last year who said that the reason for recurrent infections is my contact lens wearing and he sees it quite often -.and believes it is due to the constant touching of eyes with CL wearers (nothing to do with water or how clean you are - I am borderline OCD and am the most ridiculously hygienic/fussy person)