1. What you’re doing: You let tap water come into contact with your contact lenses.
Why you should stop: Tap water is not completely sterile and contains impurities that can harm the overall health of the eye with continued contact lens use. In addition, you should never use water in place of solution for storing your contact lenses at night.
2. What you’re doing: You re-use your solution.
Why you should stop: All the debris and bacteria that are in your eyes and are on your contact lenses come off into the solution that can increase the risk of developing an eye infection. As a substitute always remember to use fresh solution to store your contacts overnight. If dealing with solution becomes annoying strongly consider switching to daily disposables.
3. What you’re doing: You’ve been using the same contact lens case for as long as you can remember.
Why you should stop: Contact lens cases are designed to be kept for 3 to 6months. Anything over that time frame can significantly increase the risk of developing an eye infection.
4. What you’re doing: Your vision and/or comfort is mildly irritating but you wear your contact lenses anyway.
Why you should stop: If your contact lenses are causing you any discomfort, or your eyes look just the slightest bit red, it’s better to listen to your body than suffer through the discomfort and potentially develop an infection.
5. What you’re doing: You put your contact lenses in after putting your makeup on.
Why you should stop: As a general rule of thumb always remember to put contacts in before putting make up on in the mornings and always taking contacts out before removing any make up. This is a habit that provides the least amount of make-up building up on contacts that can consistently create discomfort and blurred vision.
6. What you’re doing: You sleep in your contact lenses sometimes.
Why you should stop: Sleeping with contacts in your eyes severely limits oxygen transmission when the eyes are craving oxygen the most! When you are awake, your cornea receives oxygen from the air and from your own natural tears. But when you’re asleep the cornea receives significantly less oxygen as a result of not being open and not blinking regularly. The contacts will definitely dehydrate over time and can jeopardize the integrity of the lens, further allowing microorganisms to be introduced and can cause an eye infection. For those of you who are adamant on sleeping in your contacts, please consider sleeping in them less and use Clear Care (3% hydrogen peroxide solution) as often as possible for thorough disinfection.
