If you could easily improve your eye health would you do it? We often do what we can to maintain our health, but we we don’t always think about what we can do to make it better. Here are six simple hacks to improve your eye health:
Eat Super Foods
Eat super foods like carrots, eggs, leafy greens, nuts and berries regularly. They are packed with nutrients that will keep your vision in shape. These foods help fight age-related vision problems like macular degeneration. Omega-3 Fatty acids found in oily fish like salmon, help maintain the eye’s protective tear film, minimize dry eyes and prevent cataracts.
Exercise Your Most Active Muscle
Your eyes are your fastest and most active muscles in your body. Challenge your vision with optical illusions and memory games. Other vision exercises you can do are blinking rapidly, improve flexibility by tracing a sideways figure eight with your eyes, and near and far focusing.
Stop Smoking ASAP
Smoking significantly increases your risk of developing cataracts, the leading cause of blindness in the world. Smoking can also cause optic nerve damage, macular degeneration, glaucoma and diabetic related retinopathy. Smoking can cause dry eyes & can result in increased wrinkles around the eyes. Trash your smokes now and start improving your eye health.
Maintain annual health check ups
Diabetes and high blood pressure can increase your chances for eye diseases like glaucoma and cataracts. Blurry vision can be a sign of a potential problem related to hypertension. Make sure to keep up with regular general practitioner visits, as well as your eye exams.
Take a Break from Computer Screens
Staring at a computer screen all day can lead to eyestrain, blurry vision, dry eyes and headaches. To fight eyestrain, every 20 minutes, rest your eyes by looking 20 feet away for 20 seconds. At least every 2 hours, get up and take a 15-minute break. Minimize your chances of developing dry by making an effort to blink frequently to keep the front surface of your eye moist.
Protect Your Eyes Outdoors
Take the right precautions to protect your vision when you are outdoors for extended periods of time. You should be protecting your eyes from the sun all year long, not just in the summer months. Look for sunglasses that block 99 to 100% of UVA & UVB Radiation. Prolonged exposure to sunlight can cause cataracts and macular degeneration. Too much time in harsh cold temperatures, can result in dry, dehydrated eyes. Use eye drops or a humidifier if this happens.
