Prevent Nearsightedness Complications With Early Treatment

Myopia, aka nearsightedness, is extremely common and can start in childhood or young adults. Over time it can lead to early-onset cataracts, retinal detachment, and glaucoma. MedPageToday has an eye-opening article on treatments that can prevent myopia progression and complications. For example:

Common evidence-based treatments that offer both statistically significant and clinically meaningful efficacy include daytime multifocal soft contact lenses (MFSCL), overnight orthokeratology (ortho-k), and topical low dose atropine (LDA). Novel spectacle lenses also showed a promising myopia-inhibiting effect, although with limited availability in the US at the current moment. On average, these options slow myopia progression by 30-70% compared to conventional single vision glasses or contacts. With properly selected early interventions, not only the development of myopia stabilizes at younger ages, the endpoint of the progression is also much lower, resulting in significantly lower risk of complications. Furthermore, with lower levels of myopia at stabilization, many myopic patients could be good candidates for refractive surgery with given corneal thickness.

I get the impression from the article than the treatments need to be started in childhood.

Steve Parker, M.D