Your patients don't have to settle for 20/20. According to recent clinical studies, 70 percent of Contact Lens wearers achieve better than 20/20 vision. To learn more, review the following discussion between:

Chris Snyder, O.D., M.S.
Professor of Optometry and the Chief of Contact Lens Patient Care at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) School of Optometry.

William J. Benjamin, O.D., M.S., Ph.D.
Professor of Optometry and of Physiological Optics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Optometry and Director of Clinical Eye Research at UAB's Vision Science Research Center.

1. Four ways soft contact lenses outperform eyeglasses…

Dr. Benjamin: What happens when soft contact lenses are prescribed for individuals that have less than three-fourths of a diopter of refractive cylinder, it oftentimes-actually, the majority of the time-will end up with vision in which visual acuity is better than with spectacles. Myopes wearing high minus lenses or medium minus lenses will receive a magnification of the retinal image when they go to contact lenses, and this will enhance their visual acuity and overall visual performance. Another aspect of better vision is the increased field of view that occurs with contact lenses. This occurs with either myopes or hyperopes in which the limits of the field of view incurred by the spectacle frame are no longer present when wearing contact lenses. And thirdly, there are significant prismatic effects of glasses that are virtually eliminated when contact lenses are worn. And fourth, contact lenses provide a situation where the visual axis is looking through the center of the contact lens or near the center of the contact lenses in all situations and in different gaze positions, whereas in a spectacle lens, when you look away from the optical center of the lens as you do when you're in common circumstances, you get significant color fringing and peripheral aberrations in the lenses. These are not present when wearing contact lenses and so you get a better, natural vision situation in addition to enhanced visual acuity with contacts. Medium and high myopes should immediately notice when they walk out of the office the better vision that they're getting with contact lenses. There's no doubt about it.

2. Advantages of patients achieving better than 20/20 vision…

Dr. Snyder: I certainly think that 20/20 as representation of visual acuity is considered normal. But by no stretch of the imagination is it always optimum. In fact, many patients can see better than 20/20. The resolution potential of the eye under the best of circumstances certainly can allow for people to read smaller than 20/20. And of course we clinically are very pleased and satisfied that we can classify a patient as being correctable to 20/20 normal vision but we certainly find that more precise visual correction with more magnification, particularly for myopes, certainly gives us an opportunity to not only meet patients' expectations for normal visual acuity, but also to exceed those expectations and really optimize closer to their maximum potential. And if we take the time to carefully refract and fine-tune the contact lens prescription and present the next smaller line of letter to patients, we can actually demonstrate to them that they're reading smaller letters than 20/20. And again, that's a positive reinforcement to the patient that we're doing the best job possible for them and that they personally are performing at a very high, better-than-average, optimum level for vision.

3. Percentage of patients capable of achieving better than 20/20 vision…

Dr. Benjamin: The overwhelming majority of patients who have less than three-fourths of a diopter of refractive cylinder, when fitted with an ACUVUE® 2 or other spherical soft lens as well, would be capable to achieving better than 20/20 vision.

4. Impact of a recent visual performance study on eye care practitioners…

Dr. Snyder: Well, I certainly think that information about the study data supports the recognition that better than 20/20 visual acuity is a reality with contact lenses, and it's encouraging to practitioners like myself to embrace contact lenses as a vision correction option with benefits over spectacle lenses, not the least of which is the potential for better than 20/20 acuity. I think the opportunity is there for practitioners to use this good information in their practice settings to market to their current contact lens patients and even non-lens wearers about that potential to see better than 20/20. In that way, practitioners can use patient enthusiasm to spread the word and share the message that this doctor and this practice is the place to go for excellent vision, and that it's very possible with today's contact lenses.

5. Benefits of contact lenses versus refractive surgery…

Dr. Benjamin: Refractive surgery and interest in it is largely an interest in providing a refractive correction supposedly equivalent to that of contact lenses or glasses, with less hassle. And that promise of the excellent optics with refractive surgery has not occurred yet. For the majority of patients, contact lens correction either with soft lenses or, to a lesser extent, for the population with rigid lenses, there's still the optimum optical correction. Those patients that opt for refractive surgery are doing so with the knowledge that their optics probably are not going to work out quite as nicely as they would with glasses or contact lenses.

Dr. Snyder: If we had refractive surgery first and contact lenses came as the next development, how much excitement there would be to have an opportunity to correct vision that's not permanent in the sense that if it doesn't work out well in the refractive correction, you can take the effect away, you can take the lenses off-the opportunity to precisely, predictably correct all of the refractive error in patients to a very high level. And as we know from recent research results with the spherical soft lenses that we've been talking about here, that we have the potential with a vast number of patients to achieve optimum vision- better than 20/20. And that even is true throughout the presbyopic years when patients need a little help reading up close, but refractive surgery can't really promise 20/20 vision, as has been recognized here in our conversation, where it's 20/30 and maybe 20/40. It's only with the extra help of spectacles or maybe contact lenses after the refractive surgery that optimizes the vision for that refractive surgery patient, particularly when they hit those presbyopic years.

6. How advances in technology have improved soft contact lenses…

Dr. Benjamin: Soft contact lenses in particular are much more easily fit than they once were and can be fitted on a wider population base than ever was before. There's no better time than today to be fitting contact lenses. You can fit a wider, wider proportion of the population and you can do a better job acuity-wise in doing so.

7. Achieving better than 20/20 vision-time well spent…

Dr. Snyder: Remember, one of our primary missions is to optimize vision for our patients. It would be a real shame to think that we didn't make enough time to show that one extra line of acuity and take a moment to talk to our patients about their vision and how optimal their vision has been because of what we've done for them. I don't think the reality of that doctor-patient connection will ever be broken, even by a managed care arrangement and other pressures of practice. What we are all striving for in everyday clinical practice is an opportunity, in spite of all the other outside pressures, to have a connection with patients, develop some kind of a loyalty, and build our practice where patients come back because we've taken time to make sure they know how good their vision is because of what we've been able to do for them.