4 ways to keep your eyes healthy as you age

Tips to save you from perils of eye problems as you age.

While you do a lot to stay healthy eat right, meditate, do yoga or hit the gym you often ignore one part of your body which is of utmost importance your eyes. Remember, there are no medications to improve your eye health, vision or your tired eyes. But there is a lot you can do to preserve your orbs and keep them healthy.

In today s world, we have been abusing our eyes way too much, what with constant use of mobiles, iPads, laptops, late night working, etc. Now it s time we give our eyes the much-deserved attention, says Dr Ashvin Bafna, Specialist in Vitreoretinal Surgery and LASERS, Cataract surgery, Lasik and Refractive Surgery from The Eye Associates Mumbai (TEAM). Here are nine interesting things that your eyes reveal about your health.

Here Dr Bafna shows four easy and effective eye yoga exercises to improve your eye health with least effort:

Palming: This is a relaxation technique that helps to soothe tired eyes. Relaxation of your eyes is important to help rejuvenate your vision system and take off mental strain that affects your eyes. Here is how you can take care of eye pain at home.

How to do it: Sit in a comfortable position in a chair with your head, neck and spine in the same alignment. Next, rub your hands vigorously until they become warm. Place them gently on your eyes for few seconds. Feel the warmth of your palms and relax. Repeat this at least three times or till you feel comfortable doing it. You can keep doing the exercise anywhere from five to 30 minutes.

Blinking: While we are tuned to blink numerous times in a minute, exposure to computer screens, laptops, smartphones limits this natural tendency. It makes your eyes go dry and affect vision adversely. Frequent blinking, on the other hand, helps coat the cornea of your eyes with tears and keeps them moistened naturally. Here are 10 dos and don ts of contact lenses that you need to know.

How to do it: Nobody needs to teach you how to blink as it comes to us naturally. However, if you need to blink consciously as an exercise, sit comfortably with your eyes open in a calm environment. Blink around 10 times quickly. Then close your eyes and relax. Repeat this five times after a break of 15-20 seconds between two sets. Remember while you blink don t be too hard on your eyes. A soft and natural blink should occur as the light flap of the wings of a butterfly.

Focusing or front viewing: While constantly focussing on your computer, laptop and TV screen can ruin your vision and make the nerves go tired. But focusing on natural objects as you would be doing during meditation and yoga can help enhance the optic nerve and improve its connection to the center of the brain that s responsible for vision. Here are eight natural remedies to take care of your eyes.

How to do it: Sit with legs stretched in front of the body. Place your right fist on your knee with the thumb facing upwards. Focus on a point in front and in level with your eyes. Breathe in focusing at the point in front of you and breathe out focusing on your thumb. Repeat the same with your left thumb. Close your eyes and rest.

Nose tip viewing: This works on the same principle of focusing on improving the functioning of the optic nerve.

How to do it: Lift your arm straight directly in front of the nose. Make a fist and keep your thumb pointing upwards. Focus both your eyes on the tip of the thumb. Gradually bring your thumb close to your nose till it touches the tip of your nose, all the while your eyes focused on the thumb. Hold this position for 10 seconds. Now gradually take the thumb away from your nose till your arm is straightened in front of you. Repeat this at least five times with both hands each.

Apart from this, here are a few things that will help to keep your eyes healthy,

• Eat a lot of nutritious foods that contain Vitamin A. Papaya, carrots, leafy vegetables are a rich source of vitamin A. They are good for your eyes as and your skin.

• Avoid watching TV or using the laptop from a very close distance. Using laptops or tablets in low illumination is a complete NO. Don t spend a lot of time on your electronics. An hour or two should be your daily limit.

• Pay attention to how you feel when you see. Straining your eyes can add to vision problems. Do not use bright screens of TV, laptop and iPads. Set the brightness to your comfort.

• If you have been up till late night, give your eyes some rest. Use lubricating drops to soothe your eyes. Put freshly cut cucumber slices on your eyes.

• Avoid reading books or your Kindle in the dark.

• Take breaks while using the computer of the laptop. A break of 3-5 minutes is a must after every 1 hour of constant gazing at the screen. Look into a distant object at least 20 feet away. If you have trees around, gaze at the trees. They provide a soothing effect to your eyes.

Image source: Shutterstock

---

For more articles on diseases & conditions, visit our diseases & conditions section. For daily free health tips, sign up for our newsletter.For health related Q&A, click here!