Ophthalmology includes a condition called presbyopia. It is the age-related inability to focus on and clearly see objects that are close. It is popularly known as “tired eyes” and usually appears between the ages of 40-45. This is a natural physiological alteration and not pathology.

The first symptoms are very specific: objects that are close by are seen blurred; to be able to read, you must put the text away from you and you need more lighting. This condition affects myopic people and hyperopes the same, though the later usually suffer from it earlier. It also affects people who have never worn glasses.

It is a consequence of the natural muscular deterioration caused by age. The eye has a muscle called ciliary that accommodates the crystalline lens (ocular “lens”) so those close-by images are properly seen. The ciliary muscle, as any other muscle, looses elasticity with time, and so, looses the capacity to focus the crystalline lens and see close-by objects.

At the present time, intraocular lenses are used to correct presbyopia. There is also treatment with high-end Excimer laser.

Corrective lenses:

• Conventional lenses: to correct focusing for close-by objects but not for long and intermediate distances.
• Bifocal lenses: they make it easier to alternate between close and long distance vision. Both are properly focused, close distance by the lower part of the lens and long distance by the upper part.
• Progressive lenses: they allow good vision at any distance when varying the position of the head. The structure is like the one of bifocal lenses but without the division.
• Contact lenses: they limit the system of multifocal lenses. There are also monofocal contact lenses: one to focus at close distances and the other at long distances.

Surgery:

Surgical treatment for presbyopia is not definitive. You must take into account that the ciliary muscle looses elasticity with time, even though it has been treated.

One of the surgical procedures uses laser. A prosthesis implant can also be used (Schachar technique) to recuperate the distance between the crystalline and the ciliary muscle. In some cases, intraocular lenses are implanted.

It does not require hospitalization