Eyes: what harms them and what protects them

They are the “mirror to the soul”, one of our most important sensory organs, have an effect on the metabolism and are very sensitive. Our eyes need good care and care so that they last a long time. We show you what there is to know.

None of the human sensory organs is worth more or less. However, the quotation attributed to the Roman poet Titus Maccius Plautus has a fairly high truth: “An eyewitness is worth more than ten ears.” And it’s true. We often only believe what we see. We are so fascinated by something that we can hardly “trust our eyes”. Yet many do not know how to properly handle their two windows to the world. Therefore what has been good for our eyes and what is not, we have summarized for the following article.

What the eyes can do

Many people believe that the eyes are “only” responsible for seeing. This is her most obvious main task. But they are still needed for some more important functions:

• our mood
• the hormone balance
• the sleep rhythm

Light is the key component in these three points: it falls on the photoreceptors at the back of the eyeball. These can capture the blue part of it – an evolutionary phenomenon from the days when we still lived adapted to the time of day. The signal thus transmitted to the brain is directly responsible for the release of melatonin. And this hormone regulates a lot, from our sleeping rhythm, our mood to blood pressure. A major reason for the widespread winter blues is often that sufferers get too little daylight and thus have too low a level of melatonin.

What supposedly harms the eyes

• Bad light

knows many half-truths. The most common: reading in dim light reduces eyesight. That’s wrong. For a healthy eye with full eyesight is not damaged by the deciphering of small letters in twilight, because the eye works comparatively well even in the dark. The only thing with which even healthy eyes have to struggle is the greater effort that such light conditions demand of them. They get tired faster.

• Glasses

allegedly damage the eyesight. No, this is a fake myth, which results from the fact that many people who wear glasses for a long time after long, uncorrected visual impairment believe that everything looks “strange”. But this is only due to the lack of habituation. Before you get a pair of glasses, a very extensive, two-stage test is performed. Its only goal is to create a vision aid that fits the visual impairment. Actually, putting them on is actually all weird – but only because the eyes see the world the way it really looks. Even glasses that do not fit your eyesight can not cause lasting damage.

• Squint

Also, contrary to many parents’ beliefs, it can not cause your eyes to stop in that position. No, not even if you get a blow to the back of your head or stumble. There is no mechanism that could prevent the eye muscles from intentionally squinting from returning to their natural starting point.

What really harms the eyes

However, besides these myths, there are things that can really be responsible for our eyesight diminishing or the eye getting damaged.

• Rub

almost everyone does with his knuckles, perhaps because the eyes are itchy or tired. But the disadvantages weigh heavily. Because our hands are full of germs and dirt. If we rub, these pathogens reach the eyeball and can lead to inflammation. In addition, foreign bodies can damage the cornea by rubbing – and ultimately also increases the eye pressure, which in turn is bad for the internal structure.

• Distance boredom

most people know whose tag work is limited to staring at a computer screen. And no matter how high-resolution modern monitors are, they damage our eyes. That’s because it always stays focused at the same distance for hours. The eye muscle and the lens lose their elasticity, eventually they can not adapt properly to other distances.

• Heating air

Especially in combination with the screen work leads to dry, irritated eyes. The reason for this is that the warm air literally vaporizes the protective layer of tears. Then comes the screen staring added, we also blink less, which aggravates the problem.

• Glare

is treacherous. This is because it is not the visible frequency spectrum of the light waves that damages the eyes, but the “invisible” portion in the ultraviolet range. For the everyday life that should mean to get a pair of sunglasses. And a model that suits you really well – otherwise you tend to leave it at home. For really “bright” areas, such as skiing, welding, etc., where the UV level is even higher, dedicated strong goggles should be worn. Because otherwise threatens a veritable “eye sunburn” in the form of UV keratitis, better known as snow blindness.