Many parents panic when their child comes home from school saying they can’t see clearly. Without a second thought, they start scolding the child for playing on their phone all day, then drag them straight to an optical shop to get glasses. But this approach is completely wrong.
When you discover your child has declining vision or can’t see clearly, here are the first things you should do:
First: Talk to your child about how long the vision decline has been happening. Did the blurriness come on suddenly, or has it been going on for a long time?
Second: Has your child been getting enough rest lately? How is their schoolwork and homework load?
Third: Consider whether there might be causes other than myopia, such as nutritional imbalance, other eye conditions, or any history of eye injury.
Based on your child’s feedback, you can then determine the right course of action.
We know that when the human eye looks at distant objects, the ciliary muscle relaxes and accommodation eases; when looking at near objects, the ciliary muscle contracts and accommodation tenses. After prolonged near work, the ciliary muscle may be unable to recover, leading to myopia. Children have strong accommodative abilities, and short-term ciliary muscle dysfunction can recover with rest! This state is known as “pseudomyopia.” If glasses are prescribed immediately, it can gradually develop into true myopia. So it’s quite possible that the child has simply had too much homework recently and their eyes haven’t gotten enough rest. If anxious parents rush to get them glasses, the child may never be able to take them off again.
The correct approach is:
Take your child to a regular hospital for cycloplegic refraction (pupil dilation exam) to check for pseudomyopia.
Have a visual function examination to determine if accommodative insufficiency is present and whether vision training could improve the problem.
Based on the examination results from the hospital or qualified professionals, determine whether glasses are actually needed.
The above steps should be performed by a doctor with proper professional qualifications at a hospital!
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