What Are The Causes And Symptoms Of Cataracts?
Cataracts are the leading cause of preventable blindness worldwide,[1] and a condition that our eye care professionals see frequently in our Optical Warehouse centres in Queensland. Cataracts are a type of vision disturbance that causes the natural lens within the eye to become cloudy and blurry. This cloudiness restricts the amount of light that reaches the retina in your eye, therefore affecting your vision.
While most cataracts are related to ageing and are treated in older adults, children and young adults can develop them too, either from birth or due to other medical or genetic conditions, injuries, or even certain medications. Here’s what you should know about cataracts, their symptoms, and their causes from our eye care professionals.
What Do Cataracts Feel Like?
In the initial stages of cataracts, you may not have any noticeable symptoms in your daily vision. The nature of cataracts is progessive, meaning that over time, a cataract may grow larger and affect more of the lens, making it harder for you to see.
Some people only develop a cataract in one eye, though many people will eventually develop them in both eyes. You may experience:
• Cloudy vision: your vision may appear slightly blurry as if you are looking through a camera that needs to be focused, and this can worsen over time
• Light sensitivity: cataracts can make glare or bright lights uncomfortable or even painful
• Halos: when the lens of your eye becomes cloudy, it’s difficult for light to enter it and reach your retina. Light may enter at the edges and make it appear as if light sources such as oncoming car lights or street lights have halos surrounding them - yet another reason why driving in the dark with cataracts can be dangerous.
• Faded colours: colours may appear faded or less vibrant, as the white shade of the cataracts can dull their vibrancy
• Yellow or brown tinges: as cataracts progress, the clumps of crystallins can develop a yellow or even brown hue, which can result in everything you see being tinted yellow, as if you are wearing coloured sunglasses, changing your colour perception and preventing you from seeing the difference between different colours
• Needing stronger glasses: if you find yourself feeling like you need stronger contact lenses or glasses to see clearly, you may have developed cataracts, so purchasing a stronger pair of glasses from the supermarket won’t resolve the issue
• Double vision: as light cannot enter the eyeball easily, it can result in double vision, or seeing two or more visions of a certain object
How Do Cataracts Develop?
While it may feel like a cloudy coating on the outside of the eyeball, cataracts actually occur when there is a problem within the lens of your eye. The lens of the eye, also known medically as the crystalline lens, is an essential part of the eye that allows it to focus on objects at different distances. It is located towards the front of the eyeball, and resembles a deflated ball, and is clear and transparent, to allow light to enter the eye. The role of the lens is to focus light to create the sharp images that we see. It’s very flexible, so it can change shape: it can stretch and thin out when focusing on distant objects, or shrink and thicken when focusing on near objects. This movement can bend the light to focus properly on the retina, a thin layer of tissue that lines the back of the inside of your eye, that absorbs the light that comes into your eye, and sends this visual information to your brain along the optic nerve. The lens is made up almost entirely of lens fibres and known as crystallines
Cataracts can form within the lens of your eye and prevent light rays travelling through your lens to the retina in two key ways. Most cataracts form when the fibreswithin the lens become hardened as a natural result of ageing, and as a result, the central part of the lens, known as the nucleuscan become compressed, which is known medically as nuclear sclerosis. Alongside hardening fibres, the crystalline proteins in the lens can begin to break down and clump together, and take on a yellow or even brown colour, making the lens less transparent and blocking light rays from entering the eyeball
Are You At Risk Of Cataracts?
While the majority of cataracts cases our eye care professionals see are linked to ageing, other factors that may put you at risk include:[1]
• High amounts of sun exposure to the eyes without adequate protection
• A family history of cataracts
• Having a history of eye injury
• Having had eye surgery
• Prior radiation therapy on their upper body
• Steroids for conditions such as arthritis or asthma
• Previous eye inflammation
• Sedentary lifestyle
• Smoking or a high intake of alcohol
• A deficiency in particular certain vitamins such as lutein, zeaxanthin or zinc
A number of health conditions can also increase your risk of developing cataracts, including:[2]
• High blood pressure, obesity or diabetes
• Dermatitis
• Myotonic dystrophy
• Type 2 neurofibromatosis
• Hypoparathyroidism
• Chronic anterior uveitis
• Myopia (nearsightedness)
Early Detection Can Best Support Your Eye Health With Cataracts
Early detection is the key to identifying and treating cataracts before they worsen and impact your quality of life. If you’re noticing the symptoms of cataracts and are concerned, or want to rule out anything more serious, then start with an appointment with your optometrist here at the Optical Warehouse. Cataracts can be detected in the earliest stages during one of our eye exams. Your eye care professional will work with you to assess the health of your eyes and rule out something more serious, giving you assurance and peace of mind - or forming a clear pathway to treat the underlying problem promptly.
To get your eyes assessed and detect any early changes, contact us via your local Queensland clinic here.
[1] https://www.nei.nih.gov/learn-about-eye-health/eye-conditions-and-diseases/cataracts
[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK539699/
