Finalised Literature Review 

By: Lim Ing, Li Ying, Berwyn & Ler How

Introduction:

Myopia, or more commonly know as being shortsighted has been a problem for many years, affecting a large portion of the human population. The cause of myopia is usually the over usage of the eye, thus straining it. Other factors include genetic factors and environmental factors which will contribute to the development of myopia
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Methods: 

Eye-Drops, such as atropine, pirenzipine and cyclogyl. They relax the focussing muscle of the eye. It is also said that some of these eye-drops prevent the eye from growing longer. A few studies have shown that such eye-drops do work, but then they have side-effects such as blurred vision, glare, allergy, and the risk of developing glaucoma. Myopia returns rapidly once the drops have stopped.  

Prevention And Cure

Common cures are to wear spectacles and contact lenses which match the degree of your eyes. More methods but risky treatments are Lens Implant Surgery, Orthokeratology lenses, a permanent but risky one is called ‘lasik surgery’.

Contact Lenses: Ordinary hard (Rigid Gas-Permeable) contact lenses have been used, and there is anecdotal evidence that they work. However, clinical trials have been unable to corroborate this finding. The lenses tend to cause eye irritation, especially in dusty environments.

Orthokeratology lenses: (A special type of contact lenses) alter the shape of the cornea (corneal flattening, as in Lasik). These lenses are worn by the child when they sleep, and are removed the next day. The child will be able to see without glasses or lenses but the cornea very quickly regains its shape. There have been several cases of corneal ulcers because of these lenses. Whether these lenses can reduce the rate of progression of myopia has not been proven.

Optical Undercorrection: Some practitioners believe that wearing glasses that are undercorrected for the myopia will slow down the progress of the myopia. Again no convincing evidence is available to support this but a recent study of children wearing monovision glasses (i.e. with one lens undercorrected) showed that the eye wearing the undercorrected lens did not progress as rapidly as the eye wearing full correction.

Outdoor Activity: A couple of recent studies have shown that children who participate in more outdoor activity have less myopia.

Nutritional support in the form of Vitamin A, C , E, Omega-3 and Lutein should be good for the eyes.

Lowering Intraocular Pressure: There are some who think that the increase in axial length of the myopic eye is due to increased intraocular pressure. The raised pressure is said to be due to pressure from the eye muscles to converge the eyes and the stooping posture of the head when reading. It is also said that lying down to read increases the eye pressure. There is no convincing evidence to prove all these. Studies done to reduce the IOP in myopic children have not shown any effect on myopia progression.

Data Collection:

According to the website, they had clinical tests done on each myopic progression reduction method to see if they were or were not reliable. 

Conclusion:

There is a sum of available treatment for myopia, but most of them are temporary or may hold a risk. This shows that as modern science advance more treatments are available but more safer and quicker methods must be discovered.