When you wear eyeglasses, you may feel that one pair is all you need for any activity you’re involved in but that’s not always the case. Special purpose glasses are made to fill different needs and give you optimum vision and comfort, whether they’re for on-the-job protection or eye safety during recreational activities.
Special-purpose eyeglasses will usually meet these needs better than your “everyday” glasses. Practically anyone who wears eyeglasses can benefit from specialty eyewear. Tell your eye doctor about all of the different activities you’re involved in regularly and let him advise you about the best special-purpose lenses for your needs.
Reading and Hobbies
Bifocals are fine for reading labels or other brief pieces of writing but, if you want to read a novel, tipping your head back slightly to use the reading section of the lens can cause neck pain and fatigue.
A pair of single vision reading glasses is a much better solution for prolonged reading or other up-close tasks like sewing or craft painting.
Yard Work with Power Tools
Using lawn mowers, electric weed trimmers, grinding tools and other power tools can all generate high-speed projectiles that can cause serious eye injuries. Even hammering a nail can cause flying debris. Whenever you’re working with such tools, safety glasses are a must.
Driving Glasses
There are two different categories for driving glasses:
- Sunglasses designed specifically for driving feature polarized lenses to reduce glare and special tints to enhance contrast on sunny days, for safe, comfortable vision.
- Clear prescription driving glasses for night driving should include your distance prescription and anti-reflective coating to reduce the glare from streetlights and oncoming headlights. This will allow more light to reach your eyes for better vision on dark roadways.
Sports Eyewear
You can enhance your performance on the tennis court, the golf course or on the ski slopes, by improving visual clarity and, at the same time protecting your eyes from injury. Sport-specific eyewear has specially tinted lenses that can improve your visual perception while keeping your eyes safe.
Computer Glasses
If you work in front of a computer all day, you probably already know that eye strain, fatigue and muscle strains are common problems associated with prolonged computer use.
Dubbed “computer glasses,” these lenses are specifically designed to make the most of your eyesight at the intermediate and close-up distances you use during computer work. You can help to reduce eyestrain with eyewear specially made to give you the best correction for these distances.
Another eye health factor that is attributed to computers and is potentially sight-damaging is blue light. Blue light is the high-energy light that comes from computer screens, televisions and smartphones. Besides causing eyestrain, studies have shown that exposure to blue light has the potential to increase the risk of macular degeneration over time. Computer glasses often have special coatings or lenses made specifically to filter blue light.
