Prof Chris Dickinson’s timely Optician blue light article (29/9) has kicked some life back into the blue absorber ophthalmic lens topic. One does feel the outcome of the GOC and Boots saga rendered a huge disservice as just sweeping it all under an expensive bright blue carpet was not really the best result when this topic deserves quite the opposite, greater open debate.
A large proportion of the UK’s optical workforce warrants retraining on blue, although what would seem even more challenging is to define a message that all can actually agree. Boots, Vision Express and others were addressing a serious topic with potentially critical visual outcomes 50 years or more down the line. It was a great shame any clinical messages became foolishly tangled in marketing wire.
Where we might disagree with Prof Chris Dickinson’s conclusion is that it does not always appear to need a substantive reduction in ophthalmic lens transmission/absorption to achieve a noticeable difference for wearers. Specifiers perhaps need reminding it is not obligatory to have a strong blue looking (reflex lens colour) lens to absorb across the blue spectrum, although yes they will be more yellow-olive in colour than those clearer lenses which provide little in the way of UV absorption.
All of this is not helped by a lack of consensus among researchers, new evidences evolving possible cause and outcomes pulling this way and that. However, was it not always thus at the frontier of new medical discoveries? Smart scientists acknowledge outcomes evolve as new evidence presents itself.
Even in my short ophthalmic life relative to the grand scheme of things we have moved from sparse UV absorbing lenses up to UV400nm, a lengthy pause then on through 410nm-420nm now further along to 440nm-455nm and where next? Topic Blue is going to run and run perhaps soon even drawn into myopia control issues.
Perhaps more in the spirit of November 5th it was noticeable that a posse of professors have recently commented on blue, one wonders if this has been marshalled by way of response to the rather limp advice to practitioners from their professional bodies on the blue lens topic.
It is really important feedback from everyday users is captured, we hear very mixed stories from wearers ‘I suddenly realised my sleep had improved’ to ‘I don’t want those blue things again!’ It is recognised too much light at night is a health hazard but the devil will always be in the detail.
Many operating daily at the clinic face are reporting sleep and behavioural changes among blue exposed younger individuals. All such feedback is vitally important to progress ophthalmic lens understanding; any such snippets are always gratefully received by your Rx supply industry otherwise we find ourselves left in the dark.
