UK Keratoconus Self-Help and Support Association

Hi everyone

Just a quick question - Obviously car headlights are bright for anybody; but I find driving at night especially difficult with KC :/ Has anybody got any suggestions as to anything that could help? sunglasses did occur to me but that seems a little silly at night!!

Many Thanks,

Dan

Hi Dan,
Yes, this is a common problem with KC and it's been asked before here. If you put night driving into the search engine, that should bring up some of the suggestions people have made in the past. Of maybe someone will be along in a minute with ideas.
Anne

You can get yelow overglasses but I found they cause additional problems.

However since going from RGP lenses to soft lenses for KC, there are no porblems with lights at all.

With RGP lenses, I would get startburtsts, halos, streaks form the car headlights that changed in intensity as cars got closer and if it was the head lights or tail lights which were com,plicated further by the effects the lenses caused with street lights. Without lenses we often get these effects with lights and in most cases lenses reduce these effects but as I found with RGP lenses although reduced they are poblematic. With my soft lenses these effects are barely noticeable.

The condition of the car windows can exagerate some of the effects as dirt especially on the inside scatters light too, but a good automotive glass cleaner (avoid the ones for house windows as these often leave an oily residue and can damage the tint and glass lamination) and you will be surprised at how much dirt can be lifted from a car window, even if your car has a cabin filter.

witch lenses do you use now Gareth ?, The halos and streaking of lights are my biggest bug bear by far.

I have been using Keraoft IC since they were launched and before that Kerasoft K3 and it must be about 4 years that I have been wearing soft lenses but please remember there are other lens types soft and hard.

It is often said that the VA from soft lenses isn't as good as RGP's but I get 6/5 in softs and when I gacve up on RGP's I was getting 6/9, so a massive impovement for me going to soft lenses.

Many people get hung up on VA, but in lens choice there is comfort, visual affects (e.g halos, streaks, star burst etc), length of lens wear and so on which are just as, if not more important, it is a balance that ee have to achieve.

My daughter is also pleased with my soft lenses because she likes astronomy so with no halos or starbursts I can see the faint stars she points to, even with binoculars or her telescope this was imposible before because I would always see a halo round a 10 pointed start rather than a bright dot.

thanks gareth, worth thinking about there -)

Thanks for the help guys - The brightness is my main issue - though halos and streaks are also a problem. The windscreen problem is obvious and I should have thought of that! I'll clean it today

For reference, I'm wearing Rose Kay MK2's

Dan

In one of my Institute of Advanced Motorists books it advises training yourself to lokk down slightly and to the left kurb to avouid being dazzled by oncoming headlights as modern lights are brighter than the Halogens which were common to most cars until recently when High Intensity Discharge? (HID) and now the Xenon lights which are more powerful and mimic day light more. As a driver I love the visibility Xenon lights give but I can imaging the probles they would casue to someone sensitive to light.

I remeber the Rose K's (unsure if it was I or II since I chucked it at Christmas), I had one for my right eye and I too had light sensitivity, all day including dull days were spent wearing different grades of dark glasses, very dark ones for the laboratory I worked in because I found the white walls and benches too bright and normal sunglasses in the office, none of which were a problem when I was only wearing glasses. Within six months of changing to soft lenses I no longer needed dark glasses for every day use, I only use them now on the brightest of days (as anyone should to prtect their eyes from sunlight).

Now I am of the opinion that the rubbing of the RGP lens which they do when you blink to move tears around under the lens that the point the lenses touch the cornea were rubbing (I believe optometerist aim for a three point touch for a good fitting RGP lens?) and making the cornea sensitive as I was as light sensitive as I was initially post graft. My soft lenses wrap to the contour of the cornea but have an even tear film under and still move but is more of a floating movement rather than a dragging movement so less irritating to the point I am no longer aware that I have a lens in. For me, this is the only way that I can rationalise that when I wore glasses and now on soft lenses there is no light sensitivity but why I became light sensitive with RGP's.