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Tom Ford and Dior frames with blue light filter lenses

Let’s talk about technology and what blue light can do to our eyes. It’s time to get ready for school and we have an exclusive, limited time offer at MVC for students. Read on to find out more! 

Remember those days when you would wake up early in the morning to watch your Saturday morning cartoons? Back then life was so much simpler with only a couple hours of screen time during the day. Nowadays on Saturday morning we have so many devices to choose to watch our (commercial-free) cartoons on such as tablets, smartphones, laptops and smart TVs. It’s not just for an hour or two anymore, it’s the entire day.  

We grab our phones right when we wake up to check the latest news and from there we check our phones at least every hour to see the latest viral video and unread text messages. Unfortunately, this doesn’t just affect us, but it also affects our children too! 

In school, kids don’t have to deal with the smudgy writing on the overhead projector anymore since technology has advanced to things like smartboards. Say goodbye to handing in our papers in person because now most homework is sent digitally. These days it’s hard to believe how young children are when they get their own personal laptops. I mean at most back then you would get a pager in grade school but really the only person paging us was our parents. Now our main form of communication with each other is via instant messaging on some form of screened device. 

Non-prescription blue filter glasses available at MVC

Now, why do we care about these devices? Two words: blue light. Blue light is emitted artificially from items like tablets, smartphones, fluorescent lights and LED TV screens. So what does this mean for our students? Well for one thing it means constant blue light from morning to night. As eye care professionals we worry about too much blue light exposure.  

Not all blue light is bad but daily overexposure can lead to: 

1. Eyestrain – symptoms can include chronic headaches, eye pain, dehydration and difficulty focusing. 
2. Disrupted sleep cycles (circadian rhythm) – this can cause insomnia, difficulty falling asleep at night and restless sleep. 
3. Eye disease (Age-related macular degeneration) – overexposure to blue light can cause retinal cell death and in turn put our eyes at risk for retinal diseases such as macular degeneration (central vision loss). This is the most severe risk of overusing our devices because these diseases are not reversible. 

Quick tips for screens: 

• Follow the 20-20-20 rule. Take frequent breaks every 20 mins looking 20 feet away for 20 seconds. 
• Refrain from any screen time 1 hour before bed. 
• Limit screen time to maximum one hour at a time (with the 20-20-20 rule). 
• Always wear blue filter glasses when using digital devices. 

MVC wants to help our students protect their eyes from the inevitable exposure to blue light by offering a special back to school promotion! For all glasses purchased at our clinic, we will upgrade the lenses to include a blue filter at no additional charge. If your child does not need a prescription you can still purchase non-prescription blue filter glasses!  

Not sure how a blue light filter looks like? We have samples to show you – they are barely noticeable! Stop by our store and take advantage of this amazing offer but don’t wait too long because this promotion ends September 30, 2018.