Contact Lenses, Tints And UV Protection

To reduce glare and improve contrast when playing sports, you might want to consider custom-tinted soft contact lenses. These lenses selectively filter light rays to give you greater visual comfort and help you react faster to objects (such as a baseball or soccer ball) coming your way.
Contact lenses provide many competitive advantages in sports, including a wider field of view and unobstructed vision.
The most popular tints for sports contacts are amber and gray-green. Amber lenses sometimes are preferred for baseball, tennis and soccer, whereas gray-green lenses often are recommended for golf, running and biking. But it’s really a matter of personal preference.
The best way to determine if custom-tinted contacts will enhance your sports experience is to visit a sports vision specialist for a trial fitting. Because these lenses are a specialty item, many optical stores and general eye care practices might not carry them.
Custom-tinted contact for sports are available with or without corrective lens power for nearsightedness, farsightedness or astigmatism. But even if you have perfect vision without glasses or contacts, a contact lens fitting and a valid contact lens prescription is needed to purchase custom-tinted contact lenses.
Many brands of soft contact lenses — whether custom-tinted or not — provide some level of protection against ultraviolet (UV) rays from the sun, which can harm your eyes and the skin on your face. However, this protection is limited to the area of your eye covered by the lenses. Wearing UV-blocking contacts still leaves portions of your eyes and the delicate skin of your eyelids vulnerable to the sun.
For this reason, even though it is an advantage if your contact lenses block UV, it remains important to wear sports eyewear that provides 100 percent UV protection for all outdoor sports. Hats help, too, because they cover the top opening between sunglasses and your face.

Very important: Always make sure you discuss and make decisions about your eye care based upon a formal appointment with your optician.

For more information please call us or visit

KOBRIN & MARTIN OPTOMETRISTS, SANDTON

Tel: 011 884 8413 | kobrinmartin@telkomsa.net