That's Fit

We know that it's important to eat right and exercise to care for our bodies. We buy special products and take care of our skin. Brushing and flossing take care of our teeth. But what about our eyes? It's just as important to guard our eye health -- Revolution Health gives us six simple tips for healthy vision:

• Good nutrition. Inflammation is the root cause of many eye disorders, so opt for anti-inflammatory foods when possible. Avoid red meat, choose fish and other products that are rich in omega-3s, and choose monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats (avoid saturated fats as much as possible). Also eat lots of green, leafy veggies -- they're high in lutein which is important for eye health.
  
• Protect your eyes from the sun. Wear sunglasses that have 100% UV protection. It can also be helpful to wear a wide-brimmed hat when at the beach or other sunny spots.
  
• Exercise. Moderate exercise has been proven to reduce intraocular pressure, a causative factor for glaucoma.
  
• Don't smoke. Smoking doesn't just damage the lungs -- it also damages blood vessels which, in turn, can deprive the eyes of much-needed oxygen.
• Minimize eye strain. Position your computer monitor properly (not too close and a bit below eye level) and use a glare guard.
  
• Have regular eye exams. Even if your vision isn't impaired, it's important to visit an eye doctor regularly. (Many people go annually, but you can ask your doctor what intervals he/she recommends.)

Last week my son and I went to the eye doctor for a routine check up. My son's exam went without a hitch -- his prescription is a bit stronger than before, but it's no more than to be expected. My exam, however, showed a few unexpected changes.

I've noticed that the vision in my right eye hasn't been very good lately, but I blamed it on the pair of contacts I've worn much longer than I should have. It turns out that there is at bit of a problem in my right eye, or there was a bit of a problem anyway. Though I was largely asymptomatic, sometime in the past few months I had a case of Central Serous Retinopathy (CSR).

In CSR, layers of tissue near the macula become detached and serous fluid builds up underneath. Eventually, the fluid leaks out. Some people experience symptoms such as decreased night vision, problems discriminating between colors, distortion, or even loss of sight. Most often, the symptoms are temporary, resolving themselves as the CSR heals. In my case, I did experience some visual difficulties, but they were subtle enough that I didn't think anything was wrong.

Often, CSR is caused by extreme stress but it is also associated with pregnancy. In most cases, the symptoms go away in time but sometimes a degree of visual impairment remains. (That's the way it is with me. Scar tissue is causing some permanent damage, but the damage is mild.) All I know is that this gives me a good reason to take better care of my stress levels.

Are you hitting the beach during the holiday weekend? If so, don't forget to protect your eyes from the sun! While it's always important to lather on the sunscreen before heading out, it's equally important to protect your eyes from UV rays.

Numerous eye problems can result from sun damage. Young people especially need to remember to wear eye protection as they tend to be outdoors in the bright sunlight more than their adult counterparts. A good pair of UV-blocking sunglasses is you first line protection, but wide-brimmed hats can also provide some shade.

An American Optometric Association survey revealed that 40% of Americans don't consider UV protection an important criteria in sunglasses. It is important. Look for sunglasses that block out 99% of UV-A and UV-B radiation.

My son wears glasses and I've always worried about him when he's out playing sports. A good smack to the face and he could sustain serious eye injury. Last soccer season, I chalked up the horror movies running through my mind as unreasonable mommy-worries. (Because goodness knows I have a lot of those.) But according to this article, my fears aren't that outlandish after all.

The American Optometric Association reports that there are roughly 600,000 sports-related eye injuries each year. About 13,500 of which result in a permanent loss of sight. Eye protection is a necessary measure in high-risk sports such as baseball, basketball, and football. Other sports, such as golf, tennis, and fishing, may not seem like as big of risks, but protective measures should still be taken.

Purchase protective eye wear from a sporting goods store if you don't wear glasses vision correction. If you do wear glasses, ask your optometrist for recommendations. AOL Body has more tips on sports safety and injury prevention.

Do you avoid eye exams because you hate having your pupils dilated? I do. I'm avoiding an appointment right now, in fact. Last time I went for my annual eye visit, I made it out of the office without having those blurry drops dripped into my eyes. I basically whined my way out of the procedure and my doctor, who knows me well, let me get away with it. "You have to come back," she told me. I agreed to stop in at a later date so she could examine the depths of my eyes. That was months ago. I haven't been back.

Many Pearl Vision centers are now offering an alternative for babies like me, according to the April issue of Family Circle magazine. The less-invasive optomap retinal exam involves taking a digital picture of the eye then projecting it onto a screen and printing it for future exams. Sounds much better. It's more objective too. In addition to detecting eye conditions like glaucoma and macular degeneration, the test can detect systemic diseases like hypertension, diabetes, and certain cancers.

Dilation is still the gold standard, though, since it reveals more of the retina. Bummer. I guess I'm still headed for this drippy test. One of these days.

For more on eye care, check out this AOL Body site.

I got quite the shock when I went to see my optometrist five years ago, only to have him tell me that my vision had deteriorated signifcantly and I needed glasses. I found out I was quite near-sighted, despite having near-perfect vision a few years earlier. I racked my brain to figure out what I had done wrong, and it all came down to one thing: My job. That was around the time I started to work in an office environment, slaving over a computer day in and day out. Nearsightedness is rarely caused by genetics--more often, it is caused by strain to your nearpoint vision. And the top source of that kind of strain? You guessed it--the computer.

So my advice? Give your eyes a break. Finish this article, then turn off the computer and let your eyes relax. Men's Health also has this suggestion: Close your eyes, tense all the muscle in your body and and release all at once with an exhale. Do this a few times a day, and you'll find your whole body will be less tense, including your eyes.

Macular degeneration is an eye condition which most commonly affects elderly folks. It's described as a thinning of the inner lining of the eye. This can result in big time vision loss, but the degeneration has more implications according to a new study released by Australian researchers.

If elderly individuals developed this condition before the age of 75, they were twice as likely to die within the next decade from heart attacks or strokes. When considering a later stage development, the risk goes up five and ten times respectively for the two dangerous heart problems.

However, they are quick to note that this correlation should be read carefully because apparently 3,000 study subjects isn't enough to draw definite conclusions. Even so, it took ten years to get these results. If you want to read on further, check out the article here.

Eyesight is one of the most cherished human senses -- it's also one of the hardest to repair. That's why most inventions in the retinal implant field deal with restoring people's ability to see. But what if you could enhance your vision like a robot?

That's exactly what has been developed: a contact overlaid with computer circuitry to give people bionic eyesight. This could provide you with a "heads-up" display to be used for piloting or even video games. It is actually powered by radio frequencies, but they've still got to test it out on a real person.

You may be asking yourself if the contact is flexible enough to fit comfortably in an eye. By using a technique that assembles itself with scaled-down components, it's much like normal contacts! This would be the coolest eye accessory to come along ever -- I'm going to be holding out for this to hit the consumer market in the future.

This has to be the strangest news story I've ever read, hands down. The title alone sounds like it was torn from an issue of the National Enquirer. I actually read the story twice, just to make sure that I wasn't missing or confusing any information. But, no, nothing was missing and there was no confusion. It was just, plain amazing.

Alright, let me first set the stage....

A man from Ireland, Bob McNichol, lost his sight two years ago after an accidental explosion occurred at a recycling plant. The 57-year-old was told by doctors that there was nothing they could do to help, and that his blindness would be permanent.

But ...

Employing a technique that involves the use of a tooth (yes, you read that right, a tooth) to create an artificial cornea, doctors were able to restore Mr. McNichol's eyesight!! The miracle operation, called Osteo-Odonto-Keratoprosthesis , was just performed at the Sussex Eye Hospital in Brighton, England. The tooth used in Mr. Nichol's operation was donated by his son Robert.

"Now I have enough sight for me to get around and I can watch television. I have come out from complete darkness to be able to do simple things," McNichol said in a report released today.

Another good reason to stop smoking: Macular degeneration. It's the number one cause of blindness in people above the age of 60 and can stem from cigarette smoking.

Smoking more than doubles the chances you'll acquire macular degeneration and former smokers are at risk just like current smokers. There are other risk factors for macular degeneration -- like age, family history, obesity, exposure to sunlight, low levels of nutrients, and cardiovascular disease -- but smoking is the single most preventable cause of this eye disorder.

Degeneration of the macula causes blurred central vision or a blind spot in the center of your visual field. The first sign of the condition may be a need for more light when doing close-up work. Fine newsprint and street signs may become harder to read and while these symptoms may develop gradually, they often lead to severe vision loss in one of both eyes.

A comprehensive eye exam can help determine whether or not you have some degree of macular degeneration. Quitting your smoking habit can help ensure you don't ever get it.

At some point or another we all suffer from puffy eyes, and they inevitably time their appearance before an important day at work, a social gathering, or worse yet a big date. Of course there are all kinds of beauty masks out there, and home remedies like using cucumbers or teabags, but if those don't work for you is there anything else you can try? Natural Health enlisted the help of massage therapists from a spa in New York City for advice, and they had this interesting technique to share:

• Place your index fingers in the depressions a half-inch below the inner edge of your eyebrows, below the brow bone (on either side of the narrowest part of your nose), and gently press in and upward (see a picture here).
• Hook your index fingers over the edge of the infraorbital ridge (the bone below each eye) at the very center, aligned with your pupils, and apply gentle pressure on the ridge.

The University of Copenhagen out of Denmark has managed to trace the genetic lineage of blue-eyed individuals all the way back to a single ancestor. By studying various people from distinctly unique countries like Jordan and Turkey, they discovered that everyone had brown eyes in the beginning.

However, at some point in our history, a switch was triggered which caused brown eyes to transition to blue. The way this happened was that the amount of melanin in the iris became "diluted" as they put it. This switch appears in the same genetic spot for each person, linking back to a common ancestor. The scientists referred to this as a mutation of the "OCA2 gene" which toned down the amount of melanin produced.

It just goes to show you that mutations such as these can produce beautiful results!

According to scientists, many people are a bit, shall we say, nearsighted when it comes to protecting their eyes. That's because eating a lot of carrots, despite popular belief, will not reverse or prevent poor eyesight. However, there is evidence to support the beneficial role that carrots play in protecting against age-related eye diseases.

Carrots are high in beta-carotene, which, along with other vitamins and minerals (such as vitamins C and E, and leutin) has been shown to stave off macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in older adults.

Eating carrots, so it would seem, is a preventative measure that can be taken against future eye disease, but should not be expected to help you switch to a weaker prescription.

If you're over 65, now is the time to look after health, especially if haven't been doing so up until now. And the most important thing if to talk to your doctor, to be fully honest about your health history and to get the important tests done, no matter how unappealing they may seem. Want to know which are the most important? According to AOL Body, these are ones you can't miss; your life could depend on it:

• A hearing and eye exam
• A skin cancer screening
• A colonoscopy
• Regular blood pressure screenings
• A bone density test
• A blood sugar test
• Cholesterol screening

For more advice on tests and screening, click here.

Sight is one of those most precious abilities we have, yet sadly it's one of things many people know the least about. Almost half of people surveyed said they worry more about losing their vision as they age than they do their memory or their ability to walk or hear. But at the same time only 30% of adults get their eyes checked every two years as recommended, and a whopping 79% of contact lens wearers admitted to bad habits like wearing their contacts to bed and/or wearing them longer than recommended.

What's wrong with this picture? Do you think it's because people don't know what they need to do to take care of their eyes, or just that they aren't taking it seriously?