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Contact Lens Perks for Kids

By Tara Rosenzweig

There are some fringe benefits beyond vision correction that children may get from wearing contact lenses.

A three-year, multisite study of eight- to 11-year-old nearsighted children found that contact lenses positively affect children's self-perceptions in four areas: physical appearance, athletic competence, social acceptance, and scholastic competence.

THE BENEFITS OF CONTACTS

"The ACHIEVE (Adolescent and Child Health Initiative to Encourage Vision Empowerment) Study was designed to determine whether children who were dissatisfied with spectacle wear would benefit more from contact lenses than children who did not mind wearing glasses," explains Jeffrey J. Walline, OD, PhD, Ohio State University College of Optometry and leader of the study.

Children were randomly assigned to wear either spectacles or contact lenses for three years. Here's what the study, funded by Johnson & Johnson Vision Care, found:

■ Physical Appearance. The change in the physical appearance scale score in the study was significantly greater for contact lens wearers than for eyeglass wearers.

■ Social Acceptance. During the study, social acceptance self-perceptions increased for those wearing contact lenses.

■ Athletic Ability. When results were averaged over three years, contacts improved children's perceptions of their athletic competence.

"Contact lenses provide clear vision without impairing peripheral vision, so children may feel that their athletic competence improves because they can see more clearly," Walline explains.

■ Scholastic Competence. Scholastic competence self-perceptions were also affected by contact lens wear, according to the study.

"It's likely that children who are dissatisfied with glasses chose to remove their vision correction more often than children who do not mind wearing them," says Walline.

HOW OLD IS OLD ENOUGH?

In its position paper on children and contacts, The American Academy of Optometry says that children eight years and older "can successfully wear gas permeable contact lenses and soft contact lenses" without the help of a parent. And if a child starts wearing contacts when they're very young, they may be able to care for the lenses themselves before the age of seven.

In addition, a study of more than 100 children and teenagers found that younger children are as responsible with their contact lenses as teens. The children and teens in the study were given a three-month supply of disposable soft contact lenses, which had to be removed every night and thrown away after two weeks. EB