Optrafair: Technological advances

Menicon was showcasing its silicone hydrogel daily UpSide lens which uses an innovative Smart Touch packaging technology to allow the lens to be plucked from the blister by its back surface. This ensures the front remains sterile until it meets the eye and means the lens is always the right way around speeding insertion and simplifying handling. More importantly this, says sales manager Andrew Ferguson, offers hygiene benefits for patients. ‘Many people don’t wash their hands so we are trying to make them actively compliant.’

The system works thanks to a heart-shaped smart zone which is moulded into the blister packaging. Wearers are encouraged to pinch the lens out rather than scoop it up. The design is surpisingly simple but effective. Menicon already has its Miru one day hydrogel lens which uses an innovative flat blister pack. A former offers up the lens, backside first, to the wearer providing similar hygiene benefits. Ferguson explains that while that works for a hydrogel, which has shape memory, it would not work with a silicone hydrogel. ‘It would squash it flat,’ he says.