Anyone got experience with gas permissible contact lens?
 

Got tired of wearing glasses for the last 18 years and with the new high index poly carbonate lenses, its just a PITA due to distortion. So got an appointment for contact fitting this Saturday and I am looking forward to it. My power is quite high (-6.75 and -7.00) so I was thinking of getting GP instead of more popular soft ones since GP seems to allow more oxygen, less chance of infection and better vision. But the adjustment period seems to be the only concern and all I found was contradicting opinions all across the web (not surprising!). Was wondering whether anyone has any 1st hand experience with GP, even better if GP and softs. Thanks :)

Before those contacts came out that allow you to sleep in them came around I was wearing mine for weeks or months at a time. Still do but now I use the thinner ones, I'm guessing that's what you're referring to? They're harder to put in your eyes because they're softer and harder to handle but....thanks for the reminder these have been in my eyes for months time to go change them haha. Just make sure you dry your finger tip well before attempting to put them in or they turn inside out on your finger, that's a bit frustrating

Thanks for sharing your experience :)

GP are rigid (to some extend) and are much smaller than soft ones. I guess you are wearing the soft contacts.

You better change those :razz:

BTW don't you have to (at least) take them out while showering?

Glasses are a pain but I think your main problem are the polycarbonate lenses. The material itself is less superior to a normal high index plastic lens. Nikon makes a 1.74 index lens which basically means a thinner and clearer lens. Polycarbonate has an index value of 1.586 and no matter how the company labels their product polycarbonate is polycarbonate.

Your prescription isn't very high. I have -4.50 prescription which isn't too far off of yours and I've been wearing contacts for the past 17 years along with glasses. Can I ask if you know if you have an astigmatism? That would be the second number on your prescription underneath the "cyl" column. A high or irregular astigmatism may change my opinion.

I would encourage you to try a soft lens first before using gas perm lenses. For ease of use and care as well as comfort. Many brands have lenses that allow more oxygen through the lens and are disposable daily, weekly or monthly depending on what you prefer.
Gas perms require more delicate care and must be fit by someone with a great deal of knowledge as it has to match the curvature of your cornea to achieve the most comfort and stability. Really I could go on for ever but I'm probably gonna bore you with lame facts. So I recommend you to go soft lens and go from there.

Thanks for such detailed comment :smile:

I am not 100% sure whether mine is polycarbonate but I am sure that I got a high index lens and the distortion is too much. Having to work with two monitors, I need to look at the screens directly in order to overcome distortion, which is irritating (1st world problem :lol:).

My right eye does have a -0.75 cyl and left has none. Never really bothered about that number (I had none for both eyes until my most recent checkup last year. Wonder if that will be an issue with contacts.

Yes I do agree GP has some major drawbacks (comfort and correct fitting will probably be the most important ones to me) but there are too many people complaining about blurry vision through soft lens online. Since you have been wearing them for 17 years, what's your experience?

When I was about 15 I tried gas permeable lenses. It didn't really work out too well for me, my eyes were bloodshot all the time. I hated them. It took a long time to build up immunity (for lack of a better word) but even still I was literally bloodshot eyes all the time. People would be all "WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU" and I'd be all "I have contacts". And then there'd be this awkward silence. ".... oh. Oh! Well, you look good!" Uh, apparently I don't if your first reaction for fear for my well being????

I don't know what's changed since then (that was a loooonnnng time ago apparently) but now I can wear soft lenses. My prescription is very similar to yours, but it's the astigmatism that it really matters.

I only wear them for sports though (diving/snorkeling especially!!!), or if I on vacation or something like that and I want to wear "the nice sunglasses." :lol: Otherwise I seem to prefer the glasses. I never really get used to the way I look without them. Kinda weird I guess.

But yeah .. I would never go back to the gas permeable, unless something has really changed with them since my experience. Super uncomfortable. The soft ones are no comparison. I still have trouble sometimes with getting them in, especially if I'm in a rush, but that's probably because I don't tend to wear them very often.

Thanks for sharing the experience Tony. Looks like I may not consider GP. Wouldn't want blood shot eyes, may convey the wrong message :razz:

I wasn't aware that I have astigmatism. Doc never told me about it (guess its not too much to talk about). Hopefully this will not be a deal breaker for contacts.

I am excited about getting my 1st "proper" sunglass if everything works out. Will get a Serengeti :mrgreen:

My advice would be laser eye surgery, only been 2 years since I got it done but I've never looked back. Never have to worry about glasses or contacts anymore and the cost of the surgery is relativity "cheap" nowadays.

Don't worry your astigmatism is pretty minor in comparison to what I've seen. Contacts should be ok for you. Just give them a try. The hardest part is getting over the fact that you are poking yourself in the eye with a foreign object. Once you get used to that its way better than glasses.

I am too scared of lasers being shot at my eyes. 10% failure rate is enough to keep me away and those random yellow orbs if the surgery doesn't go right is just down right scary. Not sure sure whether this has been solved but it still scares the stomach out of me. And relatively cheap is still darn expensive:razz: Just image how many corals with fancy names I can buy with that amount of money :razz:

Thanks for the hope :smile: I have had two cornea injuries in the past (one was from finger nail of a buddy at school while fighting; you know...kids and the other was when someone pushed me the nose plug of the glass went in and scratch the cornea) and have experience putting in foreign objects into the eyes. Will probably take some time to do it daily but I am pretty sure I will get used to it :)

I have been wearing Gas Perm's since 1991 and they are great! They are tough and can survive a lot. My vision is pretty bad but it's relatively stable so I've only had to replace these bad boys 3 times in all those years. Chems for cleaning are also cheap...I use Boston Advance (cleaner and storage solution) and I only need about 3 bottles of each per year at about $8-10 each.

Removing them is easy and they breath a lot better than soft lenses. They are tiny (about half the size of softies).

I even dropped one of my in my hot tub one time (don't ask how) and it took me 2 hours to find it but scooped it up, rinsed it off and popped it back in my eye.

I will say that when something gets into them (like sand at the beach) you will think a 6" spike is going through your brain in pain...but otherwise I couldn't imagine going without them.

Its not immunity, its just that they were so rigid you needed to develop a callous on the inside of your eyelid before the pain went away. I lasted about 5 minutes trying those out before going to regular.

Currently I use monthly disposables. My eyes leave protein deposits on the 2 year ones that just doesn't come off no matter what solution I use. I've been with the disposable ones for about 15 years now. I use the Air Optix ones, they're nice and thin. Love them but I'd like to get my eyes lasered and might look into that soon as I have astigmatism and the toric lenses never get the prescription quite right.

When I wore the GP a few years ago, they provide less oxygen to your eyes causing them to be bloodshot. Not sure if it's still the same today.

They are clearer.

You can't rub your eyes when wearing GPs. They will easily move to the back of your eyes. Taking them off is different.

If you're able to wear them, GP's are overall better than the soft lenses.

Thanks for all the helpful information :smile: I will probably try to go extended soft lenses after reading these but in the end, I will see what the doc suggests are the best for my eyes.

Laser surgery to correct vision does involve risk & has its cons, but for me the pros far outweighed the hassle I experienced with glasses & contacts. I switched from glasses to contacts a looooong time ago since I was active in sports & glasses were a huge hindrance. Everyone is different & my contact lens experience dates back to well before GP lenses were available. In fact, soft contact lenses were relatively new at the time.

Anyhow, I always had red eyes when wearing soft contacts & they were never what I consider comfortable in my eyes. Some days were better than others, but overall, I put up with the irritation to make my participation in sporting activities less of a hassle. I also recall forgetting to keep my eyes closed one time as I dived into a swimming pool and guess what happened.... one of the contacts was washed out & I was knackered since it happened far from home in Arizona. Not a big deal these days since replacement contacts are fairly inexpensive, but back in the '80s, that was not the case. You generally had to order them through your optometrist & wait. No buying off the shelf like today.

It's been quite a few years now that I had the lasik done. The thing that convinced me to go for it was that the son of a friend who was renting a room in my condo had the procedure done. IME it's been some of the best money I've spent. If you're concerned about the risk, you can have one eye done to see how it goes. I threw caution to the wind & had both done straight away. Took all of 15 or 20 minutes & I was blown away when I took the patches off the next day & had better than 20-20 vision. One drawback worth mentioning is that it didn't take long for me to require glasses for reading, but I was well informed before the procedure that this may happen. It depends on your age. I was already getting close to the time where I would need reading glasses anyway, so no biggie for me. Happens to most of us at a certain age regardless.

First thing is a consultation & that won't cost you a thing. They will determine if you are even a candidate and provide you with all the pros, cons, risks etc. so that you can make an informed decision to proceed or not.

I actually still have a copy of the info sheet they gave me. Here's a link, MS Word stored on OneDrive. This is from some time in the mid '90's. Safe to assume there have been some advancements in the procedure since then.
http://1drv.ms/1PVTGVw

So yeah, sorry I don't have any info for you on GP contacts having never tried them. Nowadays it's probably not a huge investment to give contacts a try. Your eye practitioner will advise you much better than anyone on a fish forum! Time spent on a laser surgery consultation will also be a worthwhile investment, should be free.