Choosing the Best Eyeglass Lenses For You

Best Eyeglasses Overview

When choosing the best type of lens to go with, there can be a lot of confusion and a lot of misleading rumors spread by opticians, optometrists and even those in opthalmic professions. This guide is geared toward those who want to know more about each type of lens, and what exactly they're paying the big bucks for. The most popular and widely used lens materials are as follows.

-Plastic

-Glass

-Polycarbonate

-Trivex

-High-index plastic

I'll go into intimate detail about what each of these is and their pros and cons as far as when it comes to matters of price, quality of vision, single vision, and lined and unlined progressive bifocals. Plus a few other tidbits of importance. Feel free to skip to a section that interests you most, but hopefully you can come away with some new knowledge of eyeglass materials.

Plastic

Plastic is now the most common lens material. It is what is used for 99.9% of reading glasses and perhaps somewhere between 50 and 60% of all glasses orders. That's why the term "glasses" is becoming a misnomer. Plastic is so easy to make at the labs, so pliable, and available in great quantities for very little price. But is it the best lens type for you?

Price

Plastic is definitely the cheapest, with many patients being able to get a pair of single vision glasses for under $30 at some places, and even cheaper online.

Quality of Vision

At such a cheap price, one would expect there to be a lack of visual quality, but that simply isn't true. Sure, it isn't as clear to see through as glass, but no materials are, currently. It's biggest downfall is its frailty, as in its ability to chip, scratch and break in general, and in its inability to keep clean. Anyone who has ever had plastic lenses knows that they never stay clean for long. Always some dust, dirt, grime, or debris is clouding the vision. This is a problem for many, and for those that only wear glasses for reading, don't really care all too much.

Lasting Worth

Plastic breaks the quickest of all the materials, scratches the quickest, and that makes it the first in line for "I need new lenses, I can't see through these scratches anymore!" So, a pair of glasses, if you take good care of them, may last a year, but a child could ruin them in weeks, easily. That's why children are usually given polycarbonate, which is the next lens I will talk about!

Thickness and Vision Types

Plastic is the thickest of all lens types, so it is not ideal for high prescriptions. It will work, but it WILL be thick. A -8.00 will be over an inch thick at its edges, and that can be cumbersome for wearers, and look odd in turn.

As far as the different types of vision go, we'll start with single vision.

Single Vision

Single Vision means no bifocal reading addition. This means you just need simple correction for intermediate, distance, and in some cases up-close. Single vision plastic is ideal for most people, as it is cheap and unless they have an incredibly high prescription, has a fairly good amount of clarity. The bifocals however....

Lined Bifocal

For lined bifocal, plastic can work. It's not usually a problem, and labs are usually pretty good about making the glaringly obvious line not so visible. The trouble is that most people that tend to need bifocals, also have high prescriptions, and therefore will now be wearing coke-bottle glasses with a giant line through the center. A pair of lined bifocals in plastic can come out as cheaply as $50, and as much as $250, depending on where you go, and which frame you pick.

Progressive Bifocal

For progressive bifocals, plastic is NOT IDEAL. The thickness causes a problem, and also because of that thickness, the position on the lens where the bifocal progression begins has to be moved up higher which in turn leaves you with less room to see, and less reading room on the bottom, as well as absolutely NO peripheral vision through the lenses. NOT IDEAL. A pair of progressive bifocals in plastic will run you perhaps $100 on the low end, and some places will charge upwards of $300.

The decision is yours, as always. Take these tidbits of knowledge from someone who has worked in the field and seen the effects glasses have on patients.

High-index Plastic Including Progressive Lenses

High-index Plastics are becoming very popular due to the fact that they come standard with scratch-resistance coatings, anti-glare coating (I'll be talking about that later), and are the thinnest of all lenses. They aren't as durable as poly, but it's what hunters and photographers use to get the best clarity of vision for scopes and lenses.

Price

You'll be paying for these. For Single Vision, you can expect it to be anywhere between $160 for a pair, and $300 at the max, depending on frame choice. These prices are for complete pairs of glasses.

Quality of Vision

You get what you pay for. They're sharp, they're thin, and they're light. People who have never used high-index lenses usually get the "whoa" effect when they first put them on. It's like a whole new world.

Lasting Worth

Being plastic, and thin, they do run the risk of breaking, so it is not recommended for patients to order these lenses with their rimless or semi-rimless frames. They still do, of course, but we always stress poly for those types of frames because of the durability.

Now, this is a tidbit of knowledge that may intrigue you. Nikon offers a special high index lens that is crafted using computers so that it is thinner than any other lens, and at the same time, allows for progressive bifocals to have the maximum seeing ability, but I'll get to that later. Another perk that is provided on these lenses is an anti-static coating that wards off any unwanted dust or grime, which is the bane of every normal plastic wearer's life.

Zeiss offers a high index option that allows for their new velocity transitions tinting, but I'll get to that later.

Thickness and Vision Types

These are the thinnest! You won't find any lenses thinner than high index, and for people with very high prescriptions, the only way they can avoid having mondo-glasses is by going with high index. High index lenses are 40% or more thinner than regular plastic.

Single Vision

Many people go for these simply because they want to be cool, or have the antistatic coating, but unless you have an incredibly high prescription, the cost isn't really worth it. For the average wearer, the thinness is waste on them, and the acuity can be found in regular plastic with an addon of anti-glare coating. So don't make them force you into something you don't need.

Lined Bifocal

For Lined Bifocals, high-index plastics work quite well. They are thin and light, and as such, the line is hardly noticeable. You'll expect to pay in the hundreds minimum, though. Somewhere around $250 minimum.

Progressive Bifocal

These are the BEST BEST BEST lenses for progressive bifocal (especially the Nikons). You will enjoy thinner lenses, brighter vision, more peripheral vision, and more reading room on the bottom, as well as eliminating that nauseating feeling that poorly-made progressive bifocals tend to give. You can't go wrong, but you WILL be paying for these. $350 to $500 is a minimum.

An example of Lens Thicknesses

Polycarbonate

Polycarbonate is the second most popular lens type in use today. Why? Because it's durable and fairly inexpensive. But there's more to that story that most Opticians aren't willing to say.

Price

Poly (as I will call it from now on) is cheap to make, but is being sold for more than it is worth usually. All childrens lenses are poly because of the durability bonus. Children's lenses are usually marked down to a reasonable price, but when converted to adult lenses, most optical shops mark the lenses up to unreasonable levels. A pair of glasses with polycarbonate for children can be as inexpensive as $30, but the minimum you'll spend for a pair of adult glasses with poly lenses is $130. An added $100 that is unreasonable.

Quality of Vision

So, for the price, what can you expect in terms of visual acuity? You can't expect much, unfortunately. My coworkers in the profession liken vision through polycarbonate lenses, especially at higher prescriptions to looked through a fuzzy fishbowl. Absolutely unacceptable.

There is, however, for usually a $15 to $30 upcharge, another version of poly that makes it thinner and have more visual acuity, but is it worth it? Only you can say that.

Lasting Worth

Poly is good for this, though. They are durable as it gets. The MOST durable. I've hit one lens with a hammer before and it didn't phase or scratch it. I wouldn't recommend doing such things, but with poly, you don't have to worry about dropping and breaking your glasses, the lenses at least. The lenses usually outlive the frame, which can take 2-3 years of consistent wear.

Thickness and Vision Types

Poly is about 60% as thick as plastic, so you shave off about a third of the thickness right away. If you go with the higher end poly option, it's perhaps another 10 percent thinner.

As far as the different types of vision go, we'll start with single vision.

Single Vision

For single vision, I've had more turns on these than anything because most wearers were talked out of plastic and into poly for simple everyday wear, and simply couldn't get used to how their vision looked.. It can be disorienting, and the again, some children grow up wearing poly and don't want to switch.

Lined Bifocal

Unfortuately, or fortunately, depending, poly does not come in lined bifocal. Trivex came about as an answer to that dilemma.

Progressive Bifocal

Very few people go for progressive bifocals in poly. It's because of the cost. They hear that they must pay hundreds of dollars for glasses that are thinner, and that's when they decide to step it up to the high-index plastic options that I'll get to next. You can do Progressive poly, but for only a few dollars more, why not just go for the thinner, lighter, brighter, high-index plastic? It's a question that most patients have no problem answering.

Glass

Glass has become antiquated and only used in special circumstances or by request. While the clarity of glass is unparalleled, the thickness and weight of glass outweighs the benefits. Glass is not able to do transitions properly, or any sort of tinting really. In a year, I sold only two pairs of glass, and that was to people who had worn it their whole life and weren't about to switch up to anything else. Glass also takes longer than other lenses to be made at a lab, so its worth is invalidated.

Trivex

Trivex is the answer to the poly lined-bifocal problem. They're great lenses. Think of it as a hybrid between plastic and poly, and that's exactly what it is. A fusion between the two. It provides higher vision than poly, while thinner than plastic or poly, but it also comes at a price. The lenses alone will run around $250 for a lined bifocal. That's on the low end.

Miscellaneous Lens Coatings

Lenses can be tinted various colors. Rose, blue, yellow/amber, green, brown, gray, just to name a few. Only certain lenses allow tints though. Those would be regular plastic and high index plastic. Tints can work on glass, but it's usually pretty faint and not worth the surcharge. A tint usually costs $20.

Transitions lenses are when your lenses turn dark when exposed to ultraviolet light, and turn back to normal under regular conditions. There are usually two options for tinting colors, Gray and Brown. Gray is darker, and Brown lets more light in, but both serve the same purpose.

As mentioned before, Zeiss high index lenses have the ability to do velocity transitions which is their own technology which makes them turn dark and light much quicker, in a matter of seconds.

Anti-glare coating is a specially additive coating that can be put on any lens, but usually comes standard on poly, high-index plastic and trivex (so it is factored into the price already), but to add it to regular plastic, it usually costs around $50. Anti-glare coating is unique in that it allows more light to enter the lens, and gets rid of the halos and glares that come off of lights such as fluorescent lights; light bulbs, and street lights namely. The only downside to anti-glare coatings is that they can be defective sometimes. When this happens, within six months of receiving the glasses, the coating starts coming off in specks, which can be very annoying as they are noticeable flecks missing in the middle of your vision. This is usually covered under an optical shop's warranty, though.

Conclusion

It's all about your budget, and your needs. You have your prescription, and hopefully the optician that is working with you to meet your needs isn't more interested in your wallet than your eyes. But at any rate, here's some information for you so that you can be more prepared when going in for your next eye check-up and not fall prey to some of the trickier optical sales techniques. Have a great day!

Continue reading Choosing the Best Eyeglass Lenses For You

Eyeglass frame fitting, progressive lenses adjustments - know what you need ahead of time!

I have been wearing eyeglasses since I was seven or eight years old. In all that time I have been lucky enough to have only had significant problems two or three times. Considering all that can go wrong, I am fortunate.

Let me first explain that my eyesight is very poor. My eye doctor told me that my uncorrected vision is somewhere around 20/400, which means that what a person with 20/20 vision can make out at 400 feet, I need to be at 20 feet to see it as clearly.

That "20/400" is what eye professionals would call the Snellen range and it is absolutely an approximation, but it does have some value in understanding just how badly someone sees. I could tell you my prescription instead (OD -2.50 -2.25 097 +2.25, OS -4.50 -2.25 090 +2.25) but that isn't quite as graphic, is it? It's easier to look at at a road sign four hundred feet away and imagine someone needing to be twenty feet from it to read it clearly.

There are charts you can find that supposedly convert your prescription to a Snellen value, but they vary widely. Apparently there is no direct conversion, so take all that as approximations.

None of it matters much. Presumably your eye doctor will do a careful and professional exam and the prescription developed from that will be right for your vision.

Making the lenses

This is the first place that things can go wrong. As you'd imagine, computers play a large role in that process today, but human beings are still involved in lens making, and human beings can make mistakes.

This has only happened to me twice. Because of what I experienced, I suspect that other folks may have had similar problems and may not have known enough to complain effectively.

My original eye doctor only did exams - he worked out of an office in his home and he'd give you the prescription that you'd fill elsewhere. His son took over the business later and expanded to a storefront in partnership with someone who sold frames and did the lens making. You could still take your prescription elsewhere, but it was convenient to have it all done there.

I had purchased glasses there once before and when it came time to replace those, of course I went there again. When I arrived to pick up that latest set, I had quite a shock when I first put them on.

I mean "shock" literally. It felt like my eyes were being forced to cross. I was disorientated and slightly nauseous. The feeling passed quickly, but it was marked enough that I took the glasses off for a moment and then tried them again. I got the same reaction - it felt like my eyes were being forced to cross against my will and I didn't like it.

I told the optician this and he said that I just needed to "adjust" to them. They were progressive lenses, he explained, and that sight disorientation was normal.

I was not convinced. I had been wearing progressive lenses for some number of years by then and was well aware of that initial disorientation, but I had stopped experiencing that years ago. I said as much to the optician and he countered that my prescription had changed and, again, I just needed to get used to it.

Well, my prescription hadn't changed very much, so I didn't think that could be right, but I went along with it. After several weeks with no "adjustment" happening, I went back to complain again. Again, my discomfort was pushed away with "You'll get used to it" and I left unhappy and dissatisfied. I put up with the the morning shock for a few more weeks and then made an appointment with the doctor who provided the prescription.

I explained the symptoms as best I could and he gave me another quick exam to see if perhaps he had munged the prescription. Then he did some more tests with me wearing the lenses and finally went off to do some measurements or tests with just the glasses. When those were done, he told me what he had found: the lenses were made incorrectly.

He said he'd have a private conversation with the optician and a few days later that man called me to pick up a new pair. These were perfect and did not cause any "cross eyed" effect when I put them on. The optician apologized and I was happy.

However, imagine if I were not stubborn about this. If I had not known from my own previous experience that something was wrong, I might have let that optician bully me into accepting a badly made pair of glasses.

If you think something is wrong with your glasses or contact lenses, fuss about it. Get a second opinion or even a third if you have to. Don't let a technician's mistake affect your comfort.

I didn't want to use that optician when it came time for yet another pair. I still went to my eye doctor, but that time I decided to go the discount route and went to Walmart to fill the prescription. The price was less than half of what I was accustomed to paying, so I was initially very pleased.

Imagine how I felt when that new pair gave me a milder form of the same symptoms I had experienced five years earlier at that optician! Not only that, but the frame was obviously low quality (yes, I should have noticed that when I selected it).

I didn't even give them a chance to rectify it - I was angry and demanded a refund, which they gave without argument. I took the prescription to a chain outlet with much higher prices and got perfect lenses made for a far better quality frame. I was happy for another decade or more.

The frames

Until my most recent pair of glasses, I have never had a problem with the fit of frames. My wife says that's because I'm somewhat clueless. She notes that I have endured wounds and not been aware of them until she notices blood staining my clothing. That's true, but those cuts and scrapes came while my mind was focused on building or destroying something. I'd notice a problem with my eyeglass frames; I had simply never experienced any difficulty.

Because of my great luck in that area, I was blissfully unaware of how much can go wrong. I certainly knew that frame quality matters, but I did not know about other factors - and there may still be more that I don't know now!

Pantoscopic tilt

Old glasses vs. new: pantoscopic tilt

Look at the photo to the right. These show my previous pair of glasses beside the pair I acquired just recently. I think you can see that the leftmost pair is tilted more than the other pair. That left pair is the pair I have worn for the past six years.

That tilt matters a lot with progressive lenses. The idea with these is that the lower part of the lens is for close up work (reading, for example), the middle is for mid range tasks (watching TV) and the top is for distance (driving, for example). Adjusting your focus becomes largely a matter of tilting your head an appropriate amount.

However, the more the top of the lens tilts forward, away from your face, the more distance correction you get without tilting. Therefore, if your prescription is correct but the tilt is not right, you won't see well at some middle distances. Watching TV might require you to tilt your head slightly for full focus or you might find that you can't quite read road signs as soon as you would like.

If the tilt on a new pair of glasses is substantially different than the old, you'll probably experience that. That was the first problem I had with my latest pair. The optician adjusted them to increase the tilt and I was immediately much happier.

Width

I have a big fat head. It's OK, you don't have to be polite, I know it and am not ashamed of it. I assume that its because I have lots of powerful brain cells. Some of my friends have less flattering explanations - I'll stick with my theory, thank you.

Regardless of why, the fact is that it is big. My earpieces need to be spread wide to fit comfortably on my extra large head. Any optician will of course assume that the frames will be going on a normal person's head, so I always need them to spread those earpieces outward.

That's easy, I'm used to that, but you do need to make them notice it if you have an unusual head width - fat or skinny. My experience is that the fitting optician probably won't notice that my ear pieces are too tight until I mention it. Then they'll laugh and agree that yes, I do have a big head.

Don't count on them to notice by themselves.

Comfort

This is where I really had trouble with my latest pair. A very short time after putting them on, I felt extreme discomfort bordering on pain.

I returned to the optician for an adjustment and brought my old pair with me so that I could show her how those fit. She looked everything over, took both pair back into her work area and soon returned to have me test her results.

I did not realize that she had become confused and had handed me back my old pair to try. I left the shop feeling comfortable and happy: the discomfort was gone.

Amazingly, it took me a week to notice my error. It was only when I tried to attach the clip on sunglasses that came with my new glasses that I realized I was wearing the old pair. Somewhat disgusted, I switched to the new pair and within a very few minutes I was uncomfortable again.

Resting on my Cheeks

Frame resting on my cheek

It may be a little hard to see in this photo, but my old eyeglasses actually had contact with my cheeks.

According to everything I have read so far, that's not a proper fit, but it does have the advantage of taking some pressure off your nose.

The pressure is not insignificant for those of us with poor eyesight who require thicker lenses. Plastic lenses are much lighter than glass, but the weight is important.

Interestingly, I expected my new glasses to weigh less than my old because they are slightly smaller. However, a postage scale registers 0.8 ounce for the new pair and only 0.6 ounce for the old. Combine that difference with no longer supporting any of it with my cheeks makes it more than enough to notice.

If you are getting new glasses, be concerned about weight. I never even thought that this new pair could possibly weigh more, but they do. The reason is that the ear pieces and the lense frame are thicker on the new pair. Stronger, probably, but they weight more.

Nose pads

At least part of my discomfort was from the nose pads. The new pair had heavier and harder pads. I'm not entirely sure why that should be the default; my old pair had soft, almost gel-like nose pads. I would have expected that everyone would prefer the more soft nose pads, but apparently they do not or do not notice.

When I returned for another adjustment, the optician changed the pads to the softer versions. That made an immediate comfort difference, though I am still not sure that I am entirely comfortable. I'll give it a week or so to adjust and see what I feel like then.

Don't be bullied

My optician is not being difficult about this at all. In fact, she wanted me to stay longer on my last visit to see if more adjustments might become apparent in fifteen minutes or so of use. I was the one who decided that I ought to give myself a longer time to adjust; I think that the difficulties I have already experienced may be coloring my perception and causing me to interpet mere difference as true discomfort.

However, as you will remember from my "cross-eyed" experience, not all opticians will be so ready to accept your opinions. I can't stress this strongly enough, and especially to those who have not had long years of eyeglass experience: if you think something is wrong, speak up and don't let yourself be talked into acceptance. Your vision and comfort are very important!

Continue reading Eyeglass frame fitting, progressive lenses adjustments - know what you need ahead of time!