Activities To Avoid In Contact Lenses

A video is going viral on Instagram by a Florida-based ophthalmologist and a digital creator Imane Tarib (dreyetarib). In her video she could be seen saying "I am not going to rest until you and everybody you know, knows not to swim, or sleep or shower in your contact lenses." She goes on to explain that she came across a patient who used to clean her contact lenses with tap water and as a result, she went completely blind. The patient had Acanthamoeba keratitis in both her eyes and had corneal transplants with many complications.

Also known as AK, it is a rare parasitic eye infection from a certain type of amoeba, which affects the cornea, the clear, dome-shaped front covering of the eye. If not treated, it can damage your eyes and cause loss of site. Though, it usually affects one eye at a time, but it can affect both. It starts with the outermost layer of your cornea, the epithelium and extends deeper.

Aside from sterile contact lens solution, any type of water can be harmful if you get it in your eyes while wearing contact lenses. As per the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), AK can be found in all types of water. Swimming in lenses may result in lenses absorbing the water and trapping potential bacteria, viruses, or other pathogens against your eye. Chlorine and other pool chemicals cannot kill these pathogens or bacteria, but can cause your lenses to destroy and the chemicals and the bacteria can enter your eyes.

While CDC suggests that all water have AK, it also suggests that it is most common in tap water or well water, which is used for taking a shower. Tap water can also cause microbial keratitis by the other germs found in water including bacteria, viruses and fungi.

As per a 2020 study published in BMJ Open Ophthalmology, it was found that contacts was the greatest hygiene-related risk factor for developing microbial keratitis. Another 2017 report published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report found that swimming in contacts was reported with a similar risk across all age groups.

The CDC says that it is not safe to sleep in your contact lenses because it makes you 6 to 8 times more likely to get an eye infection. Such serious eye infection can lead to corneal damage, surgery, and in rare cases, complete loss of vision.

The most at risk are teenage contact lens wearers.

Corneas come into contact with bacteria every day, but infections are rare because a healthy cornea is part of your eye's natural defence against contaminants. But in order to function, your cornea needs hydration and oxygen. When you wake up and blink, it keeps your eyes moist, and oxygen can flow in through the tears your eyes produce. However, contacts fit over the surface of your eye, and cuts the amount of oxygen or hydration that reaches your eyes. When you sleep, this contact decrease becomes severe, and causes hypoxia, the state of eye without oxygen and the cornea loses its ability to fight bacteria.