Articles
How often to have your eyes examined
Every two years is the usual answer and it is wrong for about half the people who hear it. What actually sets the interval is age, family history, and whether anything is being watched.
“Every two years” is the answer most people expect, and it is really only right for somebody nothing is being watched in and nothing has changed for. It is not the interval for a six-month-old, for somebody living with diabetes, or for a child already in a myopia programme, and once you take those groups out, what is left is not really a schedule at all — it is a default for whoever the other rules do not apply to.
Three things actually set the interval: age, whether anything is already being watched, and family history. Each moves the number in a different direction, and a practice that quotes one figure for everybody is quoting the easiest number to say rather than the right one for the person asking.
Children are on their own timetable
At about six months, again before school, and then yearly while they are growing. A child does not report blurred sight, because it is the only sight they have had, and none of the testing depends on them reading a letter or naming a colour — pictures, matching and lights do the same job.
A school vision screening is not a substitute and passing one is not a reason to skip the appointment. A screening looks at one thing; an examination looks at how the two eyes work together, which is the finding that matters most in a child and shows the least from across a classroom.
If something is already being watched, the interval is not up to you
Diabetic eye screening is once a year, whatever your sight is like, because the stage where something can be done about it does not change how well you read a chart. A normal result this year is not a reason to skip next year's — the comparison between the two is the finding, not the photograph on its own.
Glaucoma monitoring works the same way: pressure, visual field and the appearance of the optic nerve are worth far more as a set laid beside last year's than any one of them is alone. And a contact lens wearer is examined yearly for as long as they wear lenses, plus a follow-up two weeks after any new fitting — an eye can change under a lens without the wearer noticing at all.
Family history changes the calculation
Glaucoma runs in families more strongly than most people realise, and a family member of somebody who has it is watched more closely than the general population — your family history is the single strongest thing you can tell an optometrist about your own risk, stronger than any measurement taken on the day.
Everybody else
If none of the above applies to you, the honest trigger is not a number of years. It is noticing a change, or realising it has been longer than you think — which describes most people who come through the door. The examination covers both how you see and how your eyes are, and you find out which category you are actually in by having it, not by guessing beforehand.
Not sure when you were last seen?
Come in and we will tell you what we find, and how soon to come back.