I popularize science, you listen | Children's myopia cannot wait

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Question: No parent wants their child to wear glasses too early because of myopia, but children cannot “wait” for their myopia. When is the best time to correct their vision?

Answer: According to statistics, 80% of children with severe myopia suffer from their parents' "wait". Some parents think that their children are still young and wait until they grow up before correcting them. As a result, the children miss the best time for correction, and their eyesight becomes worse and worse until they develop severe myopia.

Let’s take a look at the three stages of myopia development:

1. Pseudomyopia stage: Excessive use of the eyes leads to ciliary muscle spasm. If scientific methods are used to relieve the spasm, vision can be restored, the development of myopia can be blocked, and pseudomyopia can be prevented from developing into true myopia. If parents discover and handle it in time, it can be controlled.

2. True low-moderate myopia stage: Our eye axis has increased significantly. For myopic patients, myopia increases by 200-250 degrees for every 1mm increase in eye axis. We usually call less than 300 degrees low myopia, 3-600 degrees moderate myopia, and more than 600 degrees (or eye axis ≥ 26.5mm) high myopia.

Children and adolescents are in the stage of growth and development. If their eye environment and habits are bad, the eye axis will grow too fast and the myopia will deepen quickly, increasing at an average rate of 50 to 150 degrees per year until around the age of 18!

3. High myopia stage: As the axial length of the eye of a myopic patient continues to grow, the anterior-posterior diameter of the eyeball continues to expand. In the process of eyeball enlargement, the retina will continue to become thinner in order to fit the enlarged sclera and choroid. To a certain extent, many small cracks will appear or lattice-like degeneration will occur in the peripheral part, which can easily lead to retinal detachment and blindness.

In order to avoid the harm caused by high myopia, our children should have their eyesight checked regularly. Once their eyesight deteriorates and myopia occurs, they need to correct their bad eye habits in time.