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PEDIATRIC EXAMS
Have your childs' eyes examined with us.
Pediatric Eye Exams in Edmonton - FAQ
Proper eyes care is an important part of your child’s development and can sometimes be overlooked or seen as unimportant. If left unchecked, impaired vision in your child can lead to falling behind in class, confidence issues, acting out, or, at worse, medical conditions arising without you knowing. Make sure you contact your pediatric optometrist in Edmonton to book an appointment before that happens.
A child should receive their first eye exam at 6 months old, again at 3, and then at 5 or six to ensure they’re not dealing with any visual impairment as they start school. This is the time that foundations for critical skills are being built and a child dealing with vision impairments may not be able to complete tasks they’re asked to or can’t fully concentrate on the tasks at hand and fall behind. If your child is acting out, you’re hearing from their teachers that they’re not willing or are avoiding reading in class, or your child is having headaches or have little to no attention span for visual tasks, you might want to get their eyesight tested by booking a pediatric eye exam with your Edmonton pediatric optometrist as soon as possible. They may require something as simple as a pair of glasses or something a little more complex such as eye therapy or surgery.
Eye and Vision Issues that Might Affect your Child
Amblyopia: Commonly known as “lazy eye,” this shows up as decreased vision in one or both of the eyes without any damage or eye health problems. Treatment may include a patch on the dominant eye in order to strengthen the weaker eye.
Strabismus: Misalignment of the eyes. Sometimes caused by a congenital defect to the muscles around the eye in charge of movement and positioning. May require surgery depending on severity and cause.
Convergence insufficiency: Inability to comfortably keep an eye aligned when reading or any near tasks. Often successfully treated with vision therapy and eye exercises.
Focusing problems: Also called accommodating problems, this is trouble changing from near to far focus or vice versa, or trouble maintaining focus for reading. Often successfully treated with vision therapy and eye exercises.
Eye teaming problems: More subtle than strabismus and can cause depth perception and coordination problems.
If you suspect your child may have any of these issues, call your pediatric optometrist in Edmonton to book an appointment today!
Comprehensive Pediatric Eye Exams in Edmonton
When booking an eye exam, it’s best to book for a time that your child is generally happy and alert in order to get their cooperation and best results. The exam will typically involve taking your child’s medical history, a vision test, eye alignment testing, and eye health examination.
Some things for you to look out for in your child are:
If you notice more than one of these, and haven’t already, it’s time to book a pediatric eye exam with your Edmonton pediatric optometrist today!
Vision Problems in Children
Take a look at the following eye problems faced by children:
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Colour vision: Testing for colour vision is important to better understand a child’s colour perception. Although there is no cure for “colour blindness”, specialized lenses including Enchroma are available to aid with colour perception.
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Myopia control: There is increasing research on trying to slow down the progression of nearsightedness in children. There are multiple therapeutic options including specialized glasses such as Zeiss Myovision and Hoya Miyosmart as well as contact lenses including Cooper MiSight daily disposable contact lenses. A daily low dose atropine drop may also be added to the regime to help reduce myopia.