•Vision care experts recommend reducing overhead lighting to minimize screen glare.
•Kenyans believe eye care in Kenya is quite expensive and inaccessible.
Image: Courtesy: Delight production254
Proper eye health remains a concern for eye experts who say people are still delaying their eye checkups and appointments until “when necessary”.
“Kenyan’s need to prioritize eye health, especially in this digital era where exposure of blue light from screens is rampant,” Diana Langat, Optometrist at Lapaire glasses told the Star on Monday.
Langat said overexposure to digital devices such as phones, computers and TV’s can affect your eyes.
“And can potentially give you headaches, cause eye strain and dry eyes. When ignored, could lead to serious eye complications.”
Langat noted that there has been an increased demand for eye care and health over the past two years, attributing this to working from home, which meant people spending more time on their screens.
“This has increased demand for computer protective glasses as patients come complaining of other eyesight related issues,”
Image: Courtesy: Delight production254
Langat recommends going for eye check-ups at least once or twice a year for both children and adults in order to uncover underlying conditions.
Vision care experts at Lapaire also recommended reducing overhead lighting to minimize screen glare and increasing the text size on devices to see screen content more easily to help avoid digital eye strain and maintain more comfortable vision while using digital devices.
Although the availability of data is limited due to lack of local studies, Lapaire glasses tested over 60,000 people across the continent, from Kenya, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin, Togo and Uganda, where its branches are located and found that 60 per cent of patients had visual impairment caused by refractive errors that are preventable.
“In Kenya alone, more than 7 million people are in need of interventions to prevent loss of vision, restore vision or need rehabilitation to improve performance,” Roseline Kilonzo, the expansion Manager-East Africa at Lapaire said.
“ Kenyans believe eye care in Kenya is quite expensive and inaccessible and it is for this reason, some people miss out on a service that could very much change their lives.”
Image: Courtesy
While opening their new branch on Kamiti Road, Kilonzo says they target to serve communities of Roysambu, Kasarani, Zimmerman, Kahawa west, Juja, Ruiru Constituencies and basically, everyone on Thika Road while offering free eye tests.
“Eye problems don’t stop with a pandemic, so it is our duty to serve our patients and offer them an adequate solution. It is also our responsibility to share with them some eye health tips to prevent any eye problems,” Kilonzo noted.
The World Health Organization (WHO) indicates that globally, nearly one billion people have a vision impairment that could have been prevented or is yet to be addressed.
Kilonzo said that they hope that the company will help revolutionize eye care to the common Mwanachi by offering affordable services and creating more public awareness of vision problems.
“Our experienced ophthalmologists and optometrists will be able to help Kenyans across our branches in Nairobi and different parts of East Africa by giving them eye care tips to maintain good eye health, and super-quality eyeglasses.”
In Kenya, the Ministry of Health estimates that 7.5 million people are in need of interventions to prevent loss of vision, restore vision or need rehabilitation to improve performance.