Eye Health Explained With Dr. Nikki Umscheid

In this episode of Hear Me Out with Belinda, Belinda Waites sits down with Dr. Nikki Umscheid of Eyes 360 for a practical and eye-opening conversation about vision, eye health, kids’ eye exams, cataracts, astigmatism, dry eyes, contact lenses, and the future of hearing and vision technology. 

They discuss the differences among opticians, optometrists, and ophthalmologists, why regular eye exams matter even when nothing feels wrong, and what parents need to know about early intervention for children. They also explore how eye exams can catch health issues early, the reality of dry eyes in Alberta, and the overlap between hearing and vision care in a smaller community. 

If you have ever wondered when kids should get their first eye exam, what astigmatism actually is, or how eye health connects to overall health, this episode is packed with helpful information in a clear, relatable way. 

In this episode, you’ll hear about: 

● The difference between an optician, optometrist, and ophthalmologist 

● Why Dr. Nikki chose optometry 

● Small-town care versus corporate care 

● How hearing and eye care both build long-term relationships 

● What cataracts are and how lens options work 

● The future of AI, hearing aids, and sound-amplifying glasses 

● Astigmatism explained simply 

● Why sunglasses and safety glasses matter 

● How diabetes, medications, and overall health affect the eyes 

● Why kids should get eye exams starting as early as 6 to 9 months 

● What Alberta Health covers for eye care 

If you found this helpful, be sure to like, comment, and subscribe. And share this episode with someone who has kids, wears glasses, or has been putting off an eye exam. 

#EyeHealth #EyeExam #Astigmatism #KidsEyeExams #VisionCare #HearingHealth #BelindaWaites #Okotoks #AlbertaHealth #Eyes360 

Host: Belinda Waites

Instagram: @belindawaites Belinda Waites - Hear Right Canada – Okotoks: where better hearing starts with listening. 

🌐 hearrightcanada.ca 

Guest: Dr. Nikki Umscheid Eyes 360 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eyes_360/ Website: https://www.eyes360.ca/drnikkiumscheid 

03:05 Optician vs Optometrist vs Ophthalmologist 

06:03 Why Small Town Care Feels Different 

10:14 How Hearing and Vision Care Build Relationships 

11:09 Cataracts and Lens Options Explained 

15:08 AI Glasses and the Future of Hearing Technology 1

6:22 Astigmatism Explained Simply 

19:19 Eye Protection and Preventative Care 

25:13 Dry Eyes in Alberta 27:07 Why Kids Need Eye Exams Early 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Having pressure in your eye that's high can damage your optic nerve and cause glaucoma. So when the pressure in your eye is high, unless it's like sky high, you don't know that. It's not something you feel. Uh, so you could be, you know, having high pressure and it's been damaging your nerve slowly over the last 10, 15, 20 years. And now you come in for your first eye exam, you see, fine, just having this near problem, but find out you have like an advanced disease. So it's another good thing just to check because it's asymptomatic until it's very advanced, but that disease can be there for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 0:33

And does Alberta Health cover adults?

SPEAKER_01 0:36

No.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

So there would be private pay or using a third-party benefit.

SPEAKER_01 0:40

They cover children and seniors. And often there is um an additional pay for, you know, the imaging and the different technology and stuff. The basic exam is covered. Uh, for 19 to 64, Alberta Healthcare does not cover eye exams. They do cover any kind of medical-related issues. So if you get a piece of metal in your eye or you have an eye infection, or you know, you're starting to get flashes of light and floaters, like all those things you might go to urgent care for, you can call your optometrist, and those are covered under Alberta Healthcare as well as disease.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Welcome to Hear Me Out with Belinda. Today I have Dr. Nikki from ISE 360 in the studio with us. Welcome, Dr. Nikki. Thank you for having me. So you are an optometrist. Yes. And you work locally here at IS360 in Okatokes. Yeah. Um, what made you become an optometrist?

SPEAKER_01 1:37

Well, going way back, I used to be a dental assistant. Um, and Damon, my husband, was in school taking his prerequisites to become an optometrist. And I had thought about it a few times, but it felt like a lot of school and very daunting. So when we got married and we're gonna move to the States, his uh university that had the optometry program also had a dental hygiene program. So that was my plan. I was going to become a dental hygienist. And then we got down there and I went to like a few of his things and I met a lot of his classmates, and I was like, I can do this. And I looked into it a little bit more, and I just decided that I felt like long term that would maybe be a better career opportunity for me. So I changed my prerequisites and I was two years behind him, but I ended up applying for optometry school and taking that route instead.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

Okay. Yeah. And so you said you started as a dental hygienist, right? I was a dental assistant. A dental assistant, okay. Yeah. And so I am pretty curious. I have right now my oldest son goes to the University of Lethbridge. Okay. And he's doing um biochemistry with the goal of riding his MCATs and going to becoming a general surgeon. Right. Right. And so it does fascinate me the need for like the undergrad. And I'm like, this is a a bit of a conversation there. But I'm curious to know how did that crossover work? Like, did you get credits for what you were doing initially before going in?

SPEAKER_01 2:59

I got a few credit hours applied, but no, I had to like load myself with courses. So I had to, you know, take all your general sciences. There's like a list at every school of what classes you need and how many credit hours you need to apply. Um, so I was taking as many as I was allowed in university and then also doing like online courses, and I went right through my summers and stuff just because we were already in the states. So I wanted to like get into school as fast as possible. And why in states? Uh, because he was down there for optometry school. Canada only has one um optometry school right now. Well, they have two, but one's French. Okay. Yeah. So he had picked that school out of all the ones we interviewed at, and it worked well since I was like the dental hygiene program was there too. Um, so yeah, I didn't want to move away from him and try and apply to other schools. It was like the one school I applied to.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

Just kind of does Canada have a shortage of optometrists then?

SPEAKER_01 3:55

They don't. They have quite a few. I think I actually heard that Mount Royal is getting an optometry program here shortly.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

Okay, that would be good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

We do need more schools here.

SPEAKER_00 4:05

Yeah, especially if there's only that one and then one in French.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

Yeah, and it's a like, you know, it's a lot to go to school in the States too, moving so far away and then with the dollar difference and the tuition difference. And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

Yeah. So what is the difference then between an optician, an optometrist, and an ophthalmologist?

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Okay, so an optician is somebody that is licensed to dispense glasses. So they can like take your measurements and recommend lenses and dispense glasses from a prescription. Um, an optometrist is a doctor of optometry, so we are the ones that would give the prescription. We can treat and manage eye diseases, like we can do glaucoma, macular degeneration, um, cataracts, all of that stuff. And an ophthalmologist is a surgeon. So if you're having problems, say you come in because you have flashes and floaters, we'll check your eyes. And if we're like, oh, you have a retinal detachment, then we would refer you to the ophthalmologist for surgery to fix that. Or same thing, like with cataracts. If you have cataracts and effect, you know, they're affecting your vision and you need to have them removed, then we would refer you to um the ophthalmologist for surgery or injections if you need injections for like wet macular degeneration, that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

So then going back to the education part, what is the difference in education then between the questions?

SPEAKER_01 5:26

With like to become an optometrist is eight years, you do, you know, your four years of undergrad, get a bachelor's degree, and then you apply for your doctor of optometry, and there's another four years you spend learning specifically about the eyes. Um, ophthalmology is a different route entirely. So they go to medical school, so like what your son's gonna do. And then from there, they apply. Um, you know, you can become a dermatologist, or you can become an ophthalmologist, or you can become a plastic surgeon. So they take a different route. Yeah. So they're a different route then.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Okay. All right. Yeah, that's super interesting. Um I was gonna ask you a question. Did you find that your undergrad helped you? Or did you like I know it's a tough one with that business of education, but I'm I'm always thinking about with the with AI coming in now. I'm like, and once again, going back to the cost, looking at my sons and um, because I have a younger son who also wants to get into the medical field. And I'm thinking, you know, that's number one, it's four years that I'm paying for what? Yeah is my question. And um, it's four years of my life, you know. So I'm just curious to know if you felt it was beneficial.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

I mean, I feel like it's like beneficial to maybe make you more of a well-rounded individual, or like some of the lessons you learn in studying and taking tests and things like that, but a lot of it it's not applicable to what I do on a day-to-day basis. Yeah. So I mean, even with um like optometry is lots of optics, like physics and that kind of stuff. So, you know, when we did ray diagrams, you learn how the light enters the eye and exits the eye and things like that. I guess it's beneficial to know and really understand the science behind it. Yeah. But again, it doesn't translate for the most part into what I do on a day-to-day basis. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:11

Yeah. Yeah, I think it's quite interesting. And then we'll switch back a little bit now because you are local to Okotokes. Yes. But I think um you grew up actually in High River. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_01 7:21

Yeah. So I moved to High River when I was in grade three and I went to school here in this area. We um moved to the States obviously for optometry school. And then when we came back, we're living in Auburn Bay. And as soon as we found out that we were pregnant with our first child, we didn't want to raise them in Calgary. We wanted to be like back in, you know, High River Oak Tokes area.

SPEAKER_00 7:43

So we right away moved back. Yeah. Yeah. And so what do you um do you like that small town feel? Do you like the connections within Oklahoma?

SPEAKER_01 7:51

Well, and our practice was first in High River. So we had Ice 360 in High River first, and then we bought this practice from Dr. Cindy Chrysell in 2015. So it's nice to live in a smaller town, but still have access to all, you know, the city amenities and stuff when we need. Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:12

Did you ever work in Calgary in the city at all?

SPEAKER_01 8:14

Yeah. So when I first graduated school, I worked in corporate optometry. So I was in Calgary, I wasn't with Ice 360. And it was good. I started like soon after doing maybe one day a week with IS 360, um, just because it was, you know, a growing practice. So there wasn't days for all of us to be working full-time there. And then over time, I like picked up more and more days and eventually I left the corporate space so that I could invest in my patients in our clinic.

SPEAKER_00 8:43

And they're yeah. And um your husband is uh uh the full owner or the co-owner of IS3.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

So he's um he has other owners with him. So event like way back when he partnered with um another optometrist in High River. So it was just the two of them, and they uh acquired another clinic in High River after the floods, um, also one in Vulcan. And then we were also um working out of Nantin.

SPEAKER_00 9:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

Then we bought this one, so we had like four different clinics between High River, Oak Tokes, Vulcan, Nantin. Um, and another owner came in. At some point, there was a little bit of a division. So um we ended up losing High River, or sorry, not High River, Vulcan and Nanton. That one optometrists took those. And then Damon and his business partner, Rambier, kept the High River and the Okatokes clinics.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Yeah. And so I used to work for a corporate hearing clinic in um in Calgary as well. And um, then when I moved into Oakotokes, we actually celebrate our five-year anniversary on Wednesday. Thank you. And um, there's a definitely a different feel about being um corporate versus I think smaller community. Did you find the same thing? Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

I loved my job like in corporate too. Like my boss was great, and I loved everybody that I worked with. Like I would still go, you know, see them and stuff. But it's different here. I'm a little bit more invested. If it's my patients and it's, you know, the people that I know are gonna come to me from years to come. And it's just feels like growing like my patient base forever versus just working, you know, always.

SPEAKER_00 10:26

I also feel like I'm gonna bump in to my clients, right? Because we we were living in, you know, the same community. And so I want to feel good about helping them and then also, you know, feel good that like, you know, when I see them out, we you know, I'm not gonna run up to them and you know, embarrass them if they haven't told anybody that they're wearing hearing aids. But I'm able to chat with them, you know, and just feel part.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

Uh that part's like hard for me because sometimes I'll be out and it's like someone's like, oh hey, blah, blah, blah. And I'm just like, oh, hi. And but then it's like, do I know you from the rink? Do I know you from work? Do I know you from like unless it's someone I see on like a very regular basis? It's hard. I try to remember people, but I'll remember faces, not names. And then I feel bad about it.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

Cause I'm like, oh, who was that person? And so you just said something that like you don't see them on a regular basis. So when um when I when I'm working with someone, so somebody will come in for their complete hearing evaluation. If we determine they have a treatable hearing loss, we'll um discuss, you know, um, different amplification options for them. And then we'll book them for their fitting and we'll start what we call, you know, the auditory rehabilitation process. Yeah. And we're seeing them within that first three months, depending on how they are adjusting to it. We could see them once a week, we could see them every two weeks. So we really are getting to know each other. Right. And then we do like a three-month checkup, then we switch to six months and then differently our annuals. So I feel like yeah, we do build a bit of a relationship. Yeah. Is that different for you?

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Yeah, it depends on the person. So, like if you have someone that doesn't really wear glasses or doesn't have anything wrong with their, you know, eye health, they just come in maybe once every year for their routine check. And unless they've been coming for a long time, yeah, then I may or may not, you know, but say somebody has like an eye infection or we're treating them for some other eye condition where that does require them to come in for a follow-up every week until it's fixed, or you know, like um people who are diabetics or have macular degeneration and stuff, we're checking them a little bit more often. So then yes, you do build relationships a little bit quicker.

SPEAKER_00 12:29

Yeah. And so tell me about like my um my sister, my dad, and my grandmother all had, I've got to get it, right? Cataracts. Okay, yeah. And so it's always something that I like when I go in. I think even when I saw you, I was like, check for cataracts. You know what I mean? Yeah. So what is a cataract?

SPEAKER_01 12:47

So mo there it's an it's an age-related change in the eye. So you have a lens inside your eye, and like this is kind of how I explain it to people is when I look at the eye of a kid, their lenses are clear. And then over time with UV exposure and age and that kind of thing, that lens starts to kind of take on a yellow appearance. So that is what a cataract is. It's, you know, your lens kind of hardening and getting a little bit darker. They take a long time to affect a person's vision. Um, so you know, say uh you're in your 60s and you come in for an eye exam, I'm gonna expect to see some changes in your lens. And usually I'll tell people just because if they ever go somewhere else and then that eye doctor tells them, they're like, why didn't my eye doctor tell me that? You know? So I just let them know, but it's not affecting your vision and it's not gonna affect your vision for like another 10 or 15 years, you know, it's nothing you need to worry about. It's kind of like wrinkles, everybody gets them. So it's a bit progressive then, mostly with age. Okay. Yeah. For sure. And there's different kinds of cataracts. Like, I mean, by definition, a cataract is an opacity in your lens. So there's congenital cataracts, I'll see kids, and they just have like a little white spot in their in their lens, and that's a cataract too. So there's different types of cataracts, but yeah, for the most part.

SPEAKER_00 13:59

And if somebody like does have cataract surgery, I know, like with my dad, then he could get different lenses and stuff. Then he didn't have to wear glasses. So he went from having to wear really thick glasses, yes, to not having to wear glasses at all.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

My aunt just sent me her list last week. She's like, okay, I saw the cataract surgeon and these are the lens options he gave me. She's like, which one should I pick? I'm like, ooh, that's a personal reference. Because yeah, you do get options. The standard lens covered under Alberta Healthcare will correct your vision for distance, but you can't see anything up close. So you'll have to put glasses on to be able to read. Okay. Which is also hard to explain to someone who's nearsighted. Like they're like, no, I read fine without my glasses. It's like, but once you have that lens removed and you're not nearsighted, you can't read without your glasses anymore. So that that lens is just like the basic one, probably the majority of people get it. Um, and then there's one where you can see far and close. It's a multifocal lens. So there's two different options there. One corrects everything, like your small print, your computer, your faraway vision, but it comes with side effects of like glare and halos. So it kind of, you know, it depends how OCD you are about your vision and whether you can handle those kind of side effects or, you know, how bad they'll even be. Obviously, it's gonna vary person to person. Um, or there's one that has more of a mid-range, like you have functional vision, like you can do computer if you're playing cards or that kind of thing and see far away. But for some of that tiny stuff, say like if you're trying to read a medicine bottle or, you know, read really small things, you're gonna have to go get reading glasses still.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Okay. Yeah. So those are the decisions that the person has to make or what's right. And you're you're gonna pay for those lenses.

SPEAKER_01 15:34

Like the standard lenses covered, but if you don't want to have to wear glasses anymore, you do pay extra for those. In my opinion, it's worth it. Yeah. Um, I'd probably do it because it's nice to be able to just see wherever you want to see without having to reach for glasses all the time.

SPEAKER_00 15:50

I think it's the same. Like there's a different quality with different technology levels, right, within hearing aids. And so there is a difference in that technology. And it's for us, it's about noise cancelling and speech enhancement. And can you have that act of social life when you're in a you know a crowd versus at home one-on-one?

SPEAKER_01 16:07

Well, there's that new glasses. Have you heard of them? The Nuance Lens or the Nuance Glasses by Sler. So they're not hearing aids, but they're like glasses that will help amplify sound. They minimize like background distractions. So say we're in a restaurant, when I'm looking at you, it like emphasizes your voice to me and cancels out all that other stuff.

SPEAKER_00 16:26

Yeah. So that's kind of I think it's pretty interesting with the way um technology is going. I'm very excited to see, you know, where it goes next. Um, I was at a presentation where somebody um, you know, was saying like hearing aids and AI are just gonna be, it's almost like even normal hearing people are gonna want to wear hearing aids just with the way the AI is going because it's gonna be almost superhuman, right? And with the technology inside it, they'll be able to, you know, leave a business meeting and sort of say to the hearing aids, hey, catch me up. Like what's happened the last half an hour, and the technology will be able to tell them their interests, you know, like it's gonna snow in 10 minutes, or, you know, um, your your kids go to school safely if they were catching the bus, right? So I think it's pretty interesting to see where technology Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

And I don't think the glasses are meant to replace hearing aids. I think it's more for like a mild hearing loss kind of thing where you're just starting to, you know, to notice that that is Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

Oh yeah. No, I get it. I think um with the manufacturers and the millions of research and development that they've put in to get so far, I don't think the um sort of the big manufacturers are going to be easily replaced in the technology for sure. So yeah. The other thing I'm curious about is stigmatism. Mm-hmm. What is that? So that's funny.

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Um K. It's just a refractive error that needs to be corrected with glasses. So I tell people there's nearsighted, far-sighted, and astigmatism. Almost everybody has a little bit of it. Uh and so if we were talking about the shape of your eyeball, if you're nearsighted, your eye is too long. So when the light enters your eye, it falls short of the retina, blurry vision, you need glasses to put the light where it's supposed to be. Same thing. If you're far-sighted, your eye is too short and the light goes past and you have the glasses to bring the light where it should be. If you have astigmatism, it's like your eyes shape more like a football instead of round like a baseball. So when the light comes in, it kind of scatters. Those people tend to experience like, you know, they might see a letter on the eye chart or a line, but don't necessarily see it sharp like the way your eye would. Maybe it's like slanted, or if you're driving, you get like those lines off the taillights of cars and things like that.

SPEAKER_00 18:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

So it's just something you correct with glasses.

SPEAKER_00 18:37

So do you think that um, and maybe you don't know the answer, but I am curious to know if people like what are diagnosed with things like dyslexia, do are they more likely to have stigmatism, or is there not really an association between No, I don't think there's a dis an association between astigmatism and dyslexia.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Okay. Um for sure, maybe more far-sightedness with like because when you're far-sighted, it's more of a focusing issue with your prescription. So for example, sometimes you have a far-sighted prescription and you can see fine, but your eyes are working very hard in order to see what they're seeing. Um, so when your eyes are working so hard just to see, you're not necessarily processing everything the way you should. It's not efficient for your visual system. Okay. So that could, you know, make it even difficult to try and manage your dyslexia and stuff versus if your eyes are relaxed and they're seeing everything clearly.

SPEAKER_00 19:31

It'll be okay. I am thinking of preventative. So my husband, um years ago, he was working on a um an old car in um the garage. And he actually did have protective eyewear on. Yeah. But he ended up getting rust in his one eye, yes, in his one eye anyway. He ended up going to, we were in um South Calgary at the time. Yeah. So he ended up going into urgent care and they had to sort of scrape the rust out of it. Um, and then I think he did end up seeing an ophthalmologist as well. Because he had surgery. I can't think of what the um what it's called, but there's some because we grew up in South Africa with the hot sun, there is something that can impact his pinguacular or pterygrimium. Yeah, something that they had to remove surgically. So he had, you know, it was all sort of coincidental at the same time. But what was interesting to me is that every if he ever needs an MRI, he can't have one because he's still got the little pieces of metal apparently within his eye. So what would you recommend for people for preventative? Like if they're gonna be working outside or you know, sunglasses.

SPEAKER_01 20:37

Well, sunglasses I recommend to everybody, just because that's like the best thing you can do to protect your eye health a lot.

SPEAKER_00 20:44

Yeah. Everyone, including kids, or just for sure. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

Yeah. Kids, especially because your lifetime exposure to UV happens typically while you're a kid, like before the age of 18. Or at least it used to. Maybe we're on screens more now, but you know, when you're outside playing all the time and stuff like that. So a lot of diseases are correlated with sun exposure. Your cataracts develop quicker when you have sun exposure. The pingguaculas or pterygiums, those, you know, little bumps on the white part of your eyes, that sun damage. Um, even like skin cancers and stuff, you know, they say five to 10% of skin cancer is on your eyelids and your skin is like a big organ. So just protecting like that thin skin around your eyes and stuff is really important too. Okay. Um, as far as safety glasses, I think that the majority of people I see who come in with like a foreign body in their eye were wearing their safety glasses. I think for men, sometimes if it's flying, it gets in their hair or their eyebrows. And then when they go to shower, it gets into their eyes because it just sits there until it falls in. Obviously, I would still recommend wearing your safety glasses for high speed objects. And I know.

SPEAKER_00 21:50

I was like, are they not like goggles that you could like stick to your face so that to prevent it from getting in? Because it was pretty scary. I mean, it is your eyesight and an impact. Everything, right? So Yeah, no, safety glasses are for sure important. Yeah. And um, yeah, so so so sunglasses and safety glasses if you're doing any activities, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

Yeah. Yep. The other thing I tell people is just like what's good for your body is good for your eyes, you know, foods that are high in antioxidants, lots of fruits and vegetables, that sort of thing. Like there's you can take vitamins, but I think you can get a lot of it through just like a good diet.

SPEAKER_00 22:24

And do you see any like disease I I d well, I can't say that right. I disease related to nutrition or medications, like uh medications for sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

Okay. Um there's certain medications, like often for like a lot of the autoimmune conditions and stuff, that can cause retinopathies. So we monitor closely for those. Um and then even things like amiodarone and stuff, it can leave little deposits in that clear part on the front of your eye, your cornea. Um so medications have a lot of medications have eye side effects. Yeah. Um for diet, not really. Like, yeah. I mean, I've never seen an eye that's not healthy specifically because they have a bad diet. Your diet's important. Um, diabetes is something that really affects your eye health. It's, you know, a leading cause of blindness. And I didn't realize that until I went to optometry school how, you know, that being diabetic is just for your eye health. So we monitor them really close. Um, since it's a vascular disease and the eye is the only place in your body where we can see all the blood vessels, we do see a lot of changes back there. Same for like people with high blood pressure or um, you know, heart disease, that kind of stuff. They often will have changes in the back parts of their eye.

SPEAKER_00 23:40

Wow. And so would you then refer to a medical doctor at all if you've seen changes?

SPEAKER_01 23:44

Like not typically if we start to see changes, no. Um, we'll m manage diabetic retinopathy up until like a certain point. If it's gonna need treatment, like if they have very uncontrolled and there's a lot of bleeding or they need injections or uh treatments for it, then for sure we refer them.

SPEAKER_00 24:01

Okay. So I'm gonna go to contact lenses. Yeah. How do you think um that industry has changed recently, like all recently or over the years, right? I know um I don't think I have I think the word changed from bifocals to progresses, but I think it's the same thing. I I could be wrong on that.

SPEAKER_01 24:18

They're a little bit different. A bifocal has a line in it, like for glasses, right? Okay. It has a line. Yeah. Um so you have near vision and far vision, whereas a progressive progressively gets stronger as you go down the lens. There's no line in it. So you have a wider range. There's more of a mid-range in it and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

So why would you get a bifocal then? Why would you put that line in? Is it easier for your eyes to adjust then?

SPEAKER_01 24:40

Or there's very few people in bifocal compared to progressives. Progressives have their, you know, stigma around them. So some people are like, no, I'm not doing it. They won't even try it. They just want to have a bifocal. I think a lot of them are like in the much older populations who were just always in them. So they want to, you know, if it's not broken, don't fix it kind of thing. If it's working for them, great. Yeah. Um, but I would always recommend a progressive over a bifocal. I feel like you're just gonna get more range of vision.

SPEAKER_00 25:09

I know I have to um branch out into the contact lenses because I know that I have a prescription where I think the one eye will be long distance and the other eye will be short distance, um, which is kind of um interesting to me to know how the brain is gonna adjust to all of that. But I also find Alberta so dry, and that's why I haven't been able to really take that leap yet.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

Well, for sure, like Calgary area has like a huge contact lens dropout rate, and it's just because it is so dry here. Um, people will go away on their vacations and they're like, I wore my contacts the whole time, and it was totally fine. And as soon as we got back, I can't wear them anymore. But yeah, it's environmental here for sure. For the progressives, they make, you know, multifocal contact lenses as well. So there's different ways to do that. What you described is called monovision. So some people have a contact that lets them see far for distance in one eye, and then the other eye would be for reading. And yes, it's a little bit of a, you know, your brain has to adjust to it and get used to it. And they have bifocal contact lenses. It's definitely not gonna be the same vision that you're gonna get out of a single vision. You know, if you're wearing contacts that are just a correct your distance vision, it's typically sharp. When you wear a bifocal, it's it's not gonna be the same crispness. I always tell people you'll get like 80% of each. So you can see far and close. It's just maybe not what you were used to before. Right. Okay. So setting the expectation there, I feel like is a big thing with success.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

And what about things like dry eyes here in Alberta? Do you find that a lot of people need to treat, like with um like a moisturizer for the eye? Yeah, for sure. Even I experienced that.

SPEAKER_01 26:42

Like I have very bad dry eyes, but I think well, our environment here, screens are a big thing. So we'll like a lot of people work on computers and normally you blink about 20 times a minute. When you're on a screen, your blink rate goes to like four times a minute. So that is a problem. Um, just not blinking like hard enough because when you're staring again, you just like do this wimpy little blink and you're not coating your eyes the way that you should. Um and then yeah, it's it's it's dry here. So I usually recommend, you know, a preservative-free drop, especially before you go to bed. Um, omega-3s can be really good for dry eye and you need a minimum of two grams a day, but that can make quite a difference. Um, you know, you can do the hot compresses and stuff, you leave it on your eyes for 10 minutes. The the benefit there is that your eyelids have glands in them. And when you blink, they put an oil on the front part. So that gets clogged really easy, especially in Alberta. So when you do the heat on your eyes, it's kind of like putting butter in a microwave. It just melts so that the oil can come out of those glands a bit easier.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

Okay. Wow. Well, this was incredibly informative for me. And um, I'll just make sure that the listeners know this was just a lovely conversation between two people for medical advice. Go and see your, you know, your optometrist or your medical doctor. For sure. Yeah. Um, is there anything else you wanted to let our listeners and viewers know today?

SPEAKER_01 28:07

Um, I would I think it's worth bringing up um when it's recommended to have eye exams because a lot of people wait until there's a problem or someone tells them to go, or because their kids aren't complaining, they don't think that they need to. But um your kids should come in for eye exams for the first time between six and nine months. Oh, wow. And then it's recommended at three years, five years, and every year after that. Alberta Healthcare pays for it. So I just feel like your eyes are your most important site. I don't, I think you should just do it every year. But often what happens is kids are super adaptable. So a lot of parents don't bring them in for, you know, an eye check. And it turns out they were only seeing out of one eye. So one eye will have like a high prescription in it while the other eye has nothing. And then the vision, you know, because it wasn't corrected at a younger age, never it it can't develop properly later on in life, even with glasses. But kids are so adaptable, they don't always realize that or know that. So it's good. And having 2020 vision doesn't equate to perfect eye health either. So I think it's good just to get a look in the back of the eye, make sure, you know, nothing's going on back there, even if they can see fine.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

Yeah. So just to reiterate that, so if um for a child specifically, if they're not seeing right, they they can actually like develop that muscle in the eye to see better. Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

So you have until maybe seven or eight, ideally, is like the best time to have your vision corrected before then, because your vision cells in the brain need a clear image in order to develop properly. So if they don't have that, then once those cells are kind of formed, you we we can't correct it later.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

It's just so that's why that early intervention is important. So all right. And then you said that it is covered in Alberta Health. And then what about as an adult?

SPEAKER_01 29:53

Um, I still recommend annually. I recommend all my patients have an eye exam once a year. Obviously, if there's something that's concerning or that we're monitoring, we'll, you know, recommend a more frequent interval, even just a specific health check on that issue. But I mean, your vision is a very important sense. So I think it's a great idea to be checking in and just making sure that nothing's changing each year. One of our um optometrists at the practice, we were demoing a machine that takes those pictures of the back of the eye. And when we all were getting our pictures done, we noticed he actually had like a retinal hole. So no symptoms or um, you know, any problems there. But the concern when you have a hole or a tear or something going on in the retina is that your retina has a much higher chance of detaching and then you could lose your vision. So he went to Calgary, had an ophthalmologist treat his hole with laser. And then a year later we took pictures and he had a new hole somewhere else. So even if even when you have something and you get it fixed, you still want to make sure that it's not changing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:54

Exactly. Well, anything I think with hearing as well, right? Just because you had your hearing test done this year doesn't mean that things don't change or can be progressive. Yeah. As well.

SPEAKER_01 31:03

So another example I'll give would be um, like a lot of people don't come in for their first eye exam until they're in their 40s because they start to notice issues with reading. Uh, but having pressure in your eye that's high can damage your optic nerve and cause glaucoma. So when the pressure in your eye is high, unless it's like sky high, you don't know that it's not something you feel. Uh, so you could be, you know, having high pressure and it's been damaging your nerve slowly over the last 10, 15, 20 years. And now you come in for your first eye exam, you see fine, just having this near problem, but find out you have like an advanced disease. So it's another good thing just to check because it's asymptomatic until it's very advanced, but that disease can be there for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 31:47

And does Alberta Health cover adults? No. So there would be private pay or using a third-party benefit.

SPEAKER_01 31:53

They cover children and seniors. And often there is um an additional pay for, you know, the imaging and the different technology and stuff. The basic exam is covered. Uh, for 19 to 64, Alberta Healthcare does not cover eye exams. They do cover any kind of medical-related issues. So if you get a piece of metal in your eye or you have an eye infection, or you know, you're starting to get flashes of light and floaters, like all those things you might go to urgent care for, you can call your optometrist and those are covered under Alberta Healthcare, um, as well as disease. So if you come in for an eye exam and you're a diabetic, you're going to pay for your eye exam. But when we want to do your health check six months later, you know, to continue to monitor for change back there, that is also covered under Alberta Healthcare.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

I think it's important to know because I think some people don't come in because they're worried about the cost, right? So I think those are very good um points for our listeners to know. So thank you for sharing that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:46

Yeah. I've felt sad when I like to take my kids to urgent care for whatever they're in for. And then I see someone who's there for an eye infection or they got something in their eye, and I want to be like, oh, I've I wish I could just take that out for you so you don't have to sit here for three hours. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:01

But and then you could dispel Alberta Health because it would be emergency or or something. Okay. Yeah. Well well, good to know. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. Um, is IS360 open on a Sunday? They're not. So we're only open Monday to Friday.

SPEAKER_01 33:16

Okay. But we do have um somebody that monitors our lines after hours for emergencies. So we have like texting and voicemail and all of that. And then if there's an emergency, like a lot of times I've gone and met people at the office if I'm around town, you know. Of course. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:29

Yeah. Well, good. Well, this was really informative and such a fun discussion. Thank you for coming in to chat with me today.

SPEAKER_01 33:35

Yes, no problem. Thank you for having me. Yeah, you're welcome.