Wear contact lenses and driving glasses at the same time?

[simon43]

I have been very short-sighted (-12) since about 5 years old (I'm now 65).  About 20 years ago I had Lasik surgery in the UK to correct my short-sightedness.  The doctor totally corrected the vision in one eye and in the other he corrected it to a little long-sighted, since he said this would then come back to perfect vision as I got older and my eye muscles weakened.

 

Fast forward to nowadays.  I need to wear glasses when reading/using the computer, since both eyes seem to be about -2.5.  But I also have a problem when driving since my eyes 'cross-over' at distance and so I see 2 cars when there is only one!  But when I was in the UK last year, I had a detailed (free) eye test and the opthamologist prescribed driving glasses to correct this problem, and this worked well.  But I have to use 2 different pairs of glasses every day (reading and driving).

 

I don't like to wear my reading glasses when teaching online with my computer, and I wondered if I could wear contact lenses all the time to provide reading/computer use, and then put on my driving glasses (still wearing the contacts) when driving.  (I wore contact lenses - hard, gas permeable, soft etc for many years and am very used to them).

 

But my optician in Laos said that this would not work! I cannot wear contact lenses AND then wear driving glasses on top.  I understand that if I wear contacts all the time to correct my vision for reading/computer work, then I would need a new prescription for my driving glasses, but is there a medical reason why I could not wear contacts all the time and then put on driving glasses when I ride my motorbike?

[Sheryl]

1 hour ago, simon43 said:

 is there a medical reason why I could not wear contacts all the time and then put on driving glasses when I ride my motorbike?

None  that I can think of

[brian2322]

This is similar to what I do.  I wear simple reading glasses on top of my contacts for reading rather than having separate "normal" and "reading" glasses.

[GinBoy2]

It's funny your brain hasn't figured it out

 

I wear contacts, and I have a distance eye and a reading eye, and I have no idea how it works but somehow my brain sorta figures it all and I see perfectly. BTW the prescription in the two eyes is wildly different.

 

So I can't see any reason why you can't do what you propose

[Liverpool Lou]

4 hours ago, simon43 said:

but is there a medical reason why I could not wear contacts all the time and then put on driving glasses when I ride my motorbike?

You'd be wearing two prescriptions that clash with each other, wouldn't you?  Maybe you can get a new driving prescription done while you still have the contacts in?

Edited March 17 by Liverpool Lou

[simon43]

1 hour ago, Liverpool Lou said:

You'd be wearing two prescriptions that clash with each other, wouldn't you?  Maybe you can get a new driving prescription done while you still have the contacts in?

Yes, of course I would need to get a new prescription for the driving glasses, but I think I need to pop back to the optician and explain again what I want (perhaps my Lao language skills aren't up to scratch!).

 

[Sheryl]

You might also try a contact lens prescription designed to yield mono vision i.e. one eye for distance and one for up close.

[GinBoy2]

11 hours ago, Sheryl said:

You might also try a contact lens prescription designed to yield mono vision i.e. one eye for distance and one for up close.

Thats exactly what I have. 

 

When you first do it takes a couple of days for your brain to sort it out, but somehow it does.

 

I can close my reading eye and I can't read.

 

Close my distance eye and I can't see distance.

 

Both eyes open and bingo my sight is perfect.

 

The human brain is pretty incredible how it works it all out