Does encouraging a 6 year child to wear low prescription reading glasses periodically help her avoid becoming nearsighted?
Nobody can truly say why we become myopic (nearsighted) as occurs during the growth years (mostly the teen years). Many people have theorized that stressing the focusing power of the eye muscle that controls near vision at an early age contributes to a person becoming myopic. It is a fact that non-literate societies did not have the degree of myopia that we do now. If this theory were true, then it is possible that growing kids who use reading glasses might have a lesser chance of becoming nearsighted, or at least might not become as nearsighted as they would otherwise later in life.
However, there has been very little evidence of support for this theory in the scattered studies that have looked into this. It certainly would not harm a child to use reading glasses, but good luck with trying to get them to do so! I could not persuade my daughter to do so even though I am an eye doctor and she grew up to be one, too.
Written by J. Trevor Woodhams, M.D. - Chief of Surgery, Woodhams Eye Clinic
