Contacts are a great alternative for eyeglass wearers who dislike glasses, but we see some wearers with some poor contact-care habits. If you find yourself doing any of these, you may be endangering your eyesight.
1 – Not washing your hands.
If your fingers aren’t clean, then your lenses can’t be clean. Always wash your hands prior to handling them. Alcohol-gel hand sanitizer is a good idea as well, but make sure it’s completely dried before touching your eyes.
2 – Forgetting to rub.
The five-second finger rub when cleaning your lenses is a vital part of the process. It breaks up any deposits that might have collected on your lens, such as skin oils. This is just like cleaning the dishes after dinner; a simple soak isn’t good enough.
3 – “Topping off” your cleaning solution.
Every time you clean your lenses, you should use a fresh batch of cleaning solution. Solution that’s already been used, and has sat out for a day or more, will have lost virtually all of its disinfecting chemicals. Cleaning with reused contact solution is really no better than cleaning with plain water.
4 – Wearing contacts too long.
Virtually everyone with contact lenses has disregarded the recommended usage from time to time, but you should avoid this whenever possible. At best it will make your eyes red, itchy, and painful. At worst, it could potentially damage your eyes by sandwiching dirt or germs against them.
5 – Washing contacts in your mouth.
The average drop of human saliva contains over 60,000 individual bacteria. Many of those can and will develop into an eye infection if given a chance. No matter how far you are from a sink or water fountain, you’re directly endangering your vision if you ever use saliva to clean your contacts.
