A recent study by contact lens manufacturer Bausch & Lomb has found that some contact lens wearers will try almost anything to clean their lenses.
As hard to believe as it is, some contact lens wearers would rather risk their eyesight than use contact lens cleaning solution.
Drinks are for drinking!
Amazingly out of the 2000 patients surveyed, some 20% admitted to using a home-made alternative to contact lens cleaning solution to clean their lenses.
Amongst the strange materials used to clean contact lenses are beer, baby oil, cola, lemonade, petroleum jelly, butter and fruit juice.
I can see why some people might choose to use alcohol; I mean vodka or gin is a good anti-sceptic and if you can use it to clean wounds, you could see why people might think it was okay to use to clean their lenses. One thing that I think they are forgetting, however, is just how painful alcohol is on open wounds and they want to put it in their eyes?
A bit of spit and polish?
Amazingly, many respondents to the survey, carried out in August 2011, admitted to using saliva or water to clean their lenses. Saliva? They can’t be serious! And we know that all sorts of micro-organisms live in water, why would you want to put them in your eyes?
Speaking about the survey, Nick Dash, an optometrist from Visual Edge Optometrists, said: “Although the numbers for the more extreme examples such as beer and baby oil were low, it is most concerning to see the risks people are willing to take when it comes to their eye health.”
He continued: “Alcohol, found in beer, is corrosive on the cornea and can cause serious lasting damage, while baby oil can irritate the eye and cause severe blurring.”
Let’s just stick to contact lens cleaning solution shall we? It was created for a reason; to keep our eyes clean and healthy. This is not an area where home-made is as good as shop-bought.
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