At some point in your life you may have met someone who couldn’t identify colors, and perhaps wondered about how it affected their life and eye health. Color blindness or color deficiency is a common eye condition, however many people still don’t know much about it. The following is what you need to know about color deficiency.
What Is Color Deficiency?
Color vision is possible due to three parts in your eyes called cones. The green, red, and blue cones live on the retina and are responsible for sensing the level of color that makes up an image. When one or more of these cone sets are absent or damaged, color vision deficiency occur and the eyes can’t recognize particular shades of color. The most common type an optometrist diagnoses is red-green colorblindness, where the patient has a difficult time detecting the difference between these shades, either seeing all those shades as the same basic color, or seeing them in variations of grey.
Types of Color Deficiency
Patients with color vision deficiency usually have issues specifically with the previously mentioned red-green shades, or with blue-yellow combinations. The following are types of color deficiency.
Dichromacy: People who suffer from dichromatic impaired vision, have simply two cones that can perceive color, as the other cone has no function.
Monochromasy: With monochromasy, you cannot see any color whatsoever. What the eyes perceive is merely different shades of gray or black and white.
Anomalous Trichromacy: People who have anomalous trichromacy have all three cones functioning. However, one cone’s light perception may be slightly less aligned than the other cones.
Achromatopsia: Contrary to popular belief, people who are colorblind are generally not seeing their entire world in shades of grey or in black and white. While this extreme eye condition, called achromatopsia, does exist, it is fairly uncommon.
Who Is Prone to Color Deficiency
Males have a higher risk of eye color deficiency than females. Research shows that the X chromosome (dominant chromosome in males) is where the biological code for most common variation of color-blindness is stored. Women who have a color deficiency are more likely to have an eye health issue that affected their color perception than to have been born with the condition.
While there is no cure for color vision issues, your optometrist should still be notified immediately if you notice signs of color vision problems. For more information about eye conditions or to schedule an appointment with one of our optometrists, call 602-955-2700 or 602 242-6888, or click here.
