What is a Comprehensive Eye Exam?
A comprehensive eye assessment is a series of tests performed by an eye doctor. It’s a detailed look at your eyes and can help detect problems with your vision, eye health, or both.
Comprehensive Eye Exam vs. Routine Eye Exam
A comprehensive eye exam in Mississauga, ON, is more thorough and usually done every 1-2 years. It will check for signs of disease like glaucoma, cataracts, macular degeneration, and diabetic retinopathy. A routine eye exam is done to check for any sign of disease that may affect your vision—you’ll see a doctor about this type of problem once every year or two at most.
Steps of Comprehensive Eye Exam
Several types of exams can be done during a comprehensive eye exam near Streetsville, including:
- Have your glasses or contacts prescription checked.
Your prescription is the amount of lens power you need to see clearly. It may be different from how you wore glasses before or may change as you age.
The results will tell them whether their eyes can see well enough with their current glasses—or if they need new ones!
- Pupil dilation
To make sure your eyes are clear, you must dilate them. This is the process of making your pupils bigger so that the doctor can see inside them better.
Your eyes naturally dilate in the dark, but some people need help doing it faster and easier with drops or eye exercises.
- Visual Acuity
Visual acuity is the ability to see objects at a distance. It is measured by the number of letters seen on the eye chart from a distance of 20 feet.
Visual acuity is determined by measuring how well an eye can see an object at a distance. This test can be done in many ways, but the most common is with a Snellen chart. At a distance of 5 feet, the person should be able to see a line that is one inch wide. This line is called the Snellen chart, and you will often hear it called the 20/20 line. If someone can’t see this thin line clearly, it’s considered an inability to focus on objects at a distance.
- Check your peripheral vision.
Peripheral vision is the ability to see things on the sides of your field of vision. It’s important to check this out because it can be affected by glasses and contact lenses. To test your peripheral vision, you will look at an eye chart with letters of different sizes spaced evenly along the top edge. The smaller letter will appear farther away than the larger one.
- Get scanned for glaucoma.
Glaucoma can cause damage to your eyes and vision. You may not notice any symptoms for years until you have advanced glaucoma or get hit with an attack.
In the test, drops are used to dilate your pupils.
You should receive one year as part of routine health maintenance at an annual visit (for example, once per year). You may also want to visit an eye clinic in Mississauga for additional exams if there are any changes in your lifestyle. Furthermore, you should get an eye exam every year, especially if you are older or have other risk factors for developing eye diseases. If you neglect your eyes and don’t get regular checkups, then they can become more susceptible to disease as you age.
What are the benefits of getting a comprehensive eye exam?
- Early Detection of Eye Diseases
Early detection of eye diseases is a critical first step in preventing vision loss.
Your eye doctor can detect eye conditions such as glaucoma, cataracts, and macular degeneration. Also, it will help with the identification of health issues that may require medical attention (such as diabetes)
- Promote eye health
If you have vision problems and are concerned about them, getting a comprehensive eye exam is important. A standard eye exam is only able to detect a few major symptoms of the disease.
If left untreated, certain eye diseases can lead to significant vision loss over time—and sometimes even blindness!
- Improvement of vision
Getting your eyes checked is a simple process that can improve your vision. You can get checked to see if you need glasses, contact lenses, or surgery to fix an eye problem. It may be time for a comprehensive eye exam if you are having trouble with close-up things like reading or working on the computer.
Schedule an Appointment
Visit Complete Eyecare for more information about comprehensive eye exams and what you can expect.
