Is it safe to wear reading glasses over my contact lenses?

Question

I'm trying a method of natural vision improvement where I need to wear progressively weaker prescriptions. It's hard to get weaker contacts that don't match my prescription, so does anyone know if it's possible to wear +strength reading glasses over -strength contact lenses to get the same affect? I wear -4.00 contact lenses, so I'm thinking that if I wore a +1 lense, I'd be seeing as if I was wearing a -3.00 lense. Does anyone know if that works, and if it's safe for my eyes? Thanks.

Answer 1

I do use reading glasses and wear contacts

Answer 2

I don't believe it's bad for you to wear readers over contacts.  Readers mostly just magnify what you are reading.  If you have astigmatism, though, you may want to get some prescription readers.

Not sure about this vision improvement thing.  Your eyes develop and age on their own and you can't do much to change that.

An optician or optometrist will be able to give you the best advice on this.  Good luck.

Answer 3

uhhh no. that will not work.  A lens with a minus strength is used to correct distance vison...more than likely you do not need correction for close-up vision.  

you still need to wear a -4.00 lens to get the proper correction...your plan would leave you 4 diopters short of 20/20 vison (in your case)

you'd also be subjecting yourself to unnecessary eye strain, both by not having the proper distacnce correction and by overcorrecting your close-up vision.

Now on the other hand...if you do need reading correction it is safe to wear reading glasses over your contacts but your distance vision will be compromised and you will need to take them off to see clearly.

Answer 4

Yes, you can do that. I got some reading glasses to use when I wear my contact lenses. I have a hard time reading with the contacts on except in strong light. I can see just fine close up without glasses or contacts and can see pretty well with my single lens glasses. I should mention I am over the age of 40. You don't say how old you are but don't get laser surgery if you're over 40. You'll still need glasses no matter what.

Answer 5

Unfortunately, there are no encouraging scientific results that exercises or progressive training programs will improve or limit the progression of a refractive error, in your case myopia.

Though it won't harm your eyes to wear plus lens reading glasses in addition to your contact lenses (people with presbyopia who need help focusing at near do it all the time), the reading glasses will just make things blurry.

-an ophthalmology resident

Answer 6

Yes you can wear glasses over your contacts lenses.  i wear them with soft lenses and I wear a contact lens over a cataract implant lens also.

Answer 7

Don't waste your time, your vision is what it is. There are no home remedies to correct visual deficiencies. All you will do here is see blurry. You won't make yours eyes any better, or worse for that matter. Just won't see clearly. It all has to do with the shape of the eye and how light focuses on the retina. By putting the readers over your contacts you are now changing the way light will focus and give you unclear vision.  your only other option would be to save up some money and have corrective surgery.

Some people, in place of bifocals, use readers over distance contacts to actually read, which is what the person above me thought. That works fine, but clearly not what you are intending to do here. I'm not sure the others get that you are trying to reduce your need for distance glasses.

I find it amusing that "John e" said people shouldn't answer that don't know what they are talking about and clearly he didn't know what your goal is here. He does not need them for reading! He wants to try to correct his need for distance glasses by effectively lessening his prescription by putting a plus lens over it. You need to read more than just the title of the question.

Answer 8

Yes you are basically right.  Wear the reading glasses over your contacts as needed.

People who don't know what they are talking about should not answer these questions.

Answer 9

You're going to s***w up your vision playing around like that.

Just get LASIK - after ten minutes you see 20/20! I had it done, my hubby had it done, and my father in law had it done.