An Explanation of Performed Eye Tests by Daniel Collins

Many people correlate a 'healthy' lifestyle with measures such as exercising, taking vitamins, eating healthily, and refraining from smoking. However, ensuring your health is fully in shape takes even more. Sometimes, it's necessary to consult a health professional for check-ups, just to ensure everything is as it should be. One example of this has to do with your vision. Even if you don't notice a drastic difference with your eyesight from day to day, it's possible for your vision to change over an extended period of time. If you already wear glasses or contact lenses this could mean requiring a new prescription. However, an eye test can do more than ensure your prescription is up-to-date. It can also monitor early signs of eye disease, such as glaucoma and cataracts, and help detect other health-related conditions such as diabetes and high blood pressure. So it's important to visit an optometrist on a regular basis, to ensure your vision is in shape. Before you go in for an eye test or vision check up, it's important to understand the different types of tests, and what each one is for. For instance, if you already wear glasses, your optometrist is likely to perform a focimetry exam - a measurement of your current spectacle power, which is taken to determine your current prescription strength. Next, refraction is usually carried out. This is when your optometrist verifies your current prescription and compares it to the focimetry readings and previous prescription details to ensure stability. Another common type of eye test is autorefraction, which reads how light passes through your eye in order to help determine your baseline prescription, while a second light-based exam is the slit lamp exam - which uses a microscope and a small beam of light to examine your corneas, conjunctiva, lids, iris and lens under high magnification. Next, the strength and pressure of your eye is likely to be measured. An ocular muscle assessment, for instance, is carried out to assess the strength and flexibility of your eye muscles, while a tonometry exam is used to measure the pressure in your eye. The latter is a key indicator in diagnosing glaucoma. One of the most common eye exams is simply the visual acuity testing - which measures the eye's ability to see details at near and far distances. The testing usually involves reading letters on an eye chart. And last but not least, your optometrist will often test the health of your internal eye - and in particular, the retina - with a retinal exam. To do this, he or she will usually use eye drops. Once you understand all the basic eye tests and what they test for, you'll be better equipped to ask your optometrist questions during your visit, and to ultimately maintain better visual health.