How to Preserve Your Employees’ Vision

Most of us take our vision for granted, but I do not think anyone would dispute how vision can impact our quality of life. March is Workplace Eye Safety Awareness Month, which is the perfect opportunity to encourage you to give eye care and the preservation of vision the attention it deserves.

It may surprise you to learn that vision problems are the second most prevalent health problem in the country. According to a 2018 report from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), 18.3 million Americans between the ages of 18 and 64, and 7.3 million over age 65 report experiencing significant vision loss. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the total annual economic burden of vision problems reaches $51.4 billion annually.

Left unaddressed, vision problems can impair performance, reduce job satisfaction, increase the risk of accidents and, in some cases, contribute to worsening vision and even blindness.

Here are five tips for preserving your employees’ vision to ensure a safe, comfortable and efficient work environment.

1.        Ensure Adequate Eye Protection

Anyone working in a field where there is a risk of damage to the eye will be well-aware of OSHA’s guidelines for eye and face protection. Farmers, other outdoor laborers, as well as factory and laboratory workers should always wear appropriate eye and face protection when on the job. Employers need to make sure guidelines for eye safety are up-to-date and that their employees are following them. One small slip up can lead to injuries that may cause devastating permanent vision loss.

Always remind your employees to wear eye protection, even if it feels uncomfortable or may slightly impair their performance. This is true during non-work hours as well when employees are participating in recreational activities or taking on projects around the house. Good eye protection should be more than just a workplace commitment.

2.        Prevent Dry Eyes

You may be surprised to learn that office work can also have a substantial impact on eye health. Dry air, glare from computer screens and other electronic devices, as well as the need to focus for long periods of time on one thing, such as keyboards, computer screens or documents, can all take their toll on eye health.

Dry eyes are one of the most common eye-related complaints among office workers, and dry-eye disease is a leading reason for people to visit their eye doctor. People with dry-eye disease will often experience burning, aching or itchy eyes, which can make it difficult to function through a normal workday. While everyone differs with regard to their natural susceptibility to dry-eye disease, many external factors contribute to the development of dry eyes. In the office setting, common contributors to dry eyes include dry air, irritants in the air, such as smoke or pollens, as well as glare from screens.

Controlling the humidity level and quality of the air in office buildings can go a long way toward minimizing dry-eye problems. Making water as well as water-rich foods, such as fruits and vegetables, readily available to employees can also help cut down on dry eyes as well as dehydration in general.

3.        Filter Blue Light

Screen exposure is another common eye hazard among office workers. As people spend more and more time using electronic screens for both work and play, it is becoming increasingly clear that the blue light emitted from these screens can have a damaging effect on the eyes. The human eye can detect light within the wavelength range of about 390 to 700 nanometers. This includes all the colors of the rainbow. Blue light exists along the shorter end of that spectrum, around 380 to 500 nanometer range. This short wavelength light actually carries with it the highest amount of energy, making it the most likely to cause damage.

Unfortunately, the eye doesn’t do a good job of filtering blue light on its own. That means it easily reaches the light-sensitive retina at the back of the eye. Not only can staring at a screen all day dry out your eyes, studies have shown that blue light may damage these sensitive cells of the retina. Over time, this can contribute to macular degeneration, an eye disease that affects central vision. When exposure to blue light occurs later in the day, it may disrupt sleep because it inhibits release of the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin.

Wearing sunglasses will block most blue light from reaching the eye, but it’s not particularly safe or convenient for people to walk around the office all day wearing sunglasses. A more practical solution is to use a blue-light filter. These can be applied directly to your screen, or they can be worn as glasses. Both prescription and non-prescription glasses can be fitted with blue-light filters, and these won’t impair regular vision in lower light settings the way sunglasses do.

4.        Address Eyestrain

Office work often requires focusing on one thing for a long period of time. Whether you’re staring at a screen, a document, or other model or project, focusing for long periods of time on one thing can produce eyestrain, which can impair vision and cause other troublesome symptoms, such as headaches. To minimize this risk, have your employees follow the 20-20-20 rule: every 20 minutes, look up and focus on something at least 20 feet away for 20 seconds.

5.        Encourage Annual Eye Exams

All employers should be encouraging their employees to get an annual comprehensive eye exam. This may be easier than you think. Recent evidence suggests that individuals are three times more likely to get an annual eye exam than an annual physical.

Why are annual eye exams so important? There are several common diseases of the eye that can lead to vision impairment or blindness if left untreated. These include cataracts, glaucoma, age-related macular degeneration and retinopathy. As with any health condition, the key to preventing permanent vision loss from eye disease is early intervention, and the key to early intervention is getting an annual eye exam. Almost all diseases of the eye have few or no symptoms in their early stages, but the early signs can be picked up during a comprehensive eye exam.

Getting an annual eye exam also ensures that employees obtain the most comfortable and effective corrective lenses they need to see optimally, which cuts down on eyestrain and other vision problems. Remember that prescriptions for corrective lenses change over time, and even small changes that go uncorrected can cause significant symptoms, such as eye pain and headaches.

Not Just About the Eyes

The eyes may be windows into the soul, but an eye exam is a window into the body. In fact, an eye exam is the only completely noninvasive way to see inside the body, putting the eye doctor on the front line, potentially detecting certain medical and eye conditions earlier.

Many factors influence the risk of developing eye disease, such as age, lifestyle, underlying genetic susceptibility, as well as the presence of other chronic diseases and how well they are managed. Since many chronic conditions affect the eyes, eye exams frequently pick up early signs of chronic conditions that require treatment to prevent serious health problems down the road, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease, sickle cell disease, thyroid disorders, arthritis, multiple sclerosis and some kinds of cancer.

Integration of Health Care Benefits

One way to encourage employees to get their eyes checked regularly is to offer an integrated health care benefits plan. Such a plan connects employees’ medical care data with their dental, vision, pharmacy and disability data. This gives primary care physicians and eye-care specialists the opportunity to work in tandem. Together, they have the tools they need to develop an early intervention plan that minimizes or manages conditions that might lead to vision loss or other serious health problems down the road. Integrated care also allows eye-care specialists to have access to patients’ medical records so that they can view information about pre-existing conditions or any medications that patients might be taking that affect vision.

Only Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield (Anthem) provides real-time visibility into a patient’s health profile (including medication, lab results, medical diagnoses and care alerts) to vision providers, so they can better diagnose and help members. In just one example, Anthem Whole Health Connection?, the integrated health care program offered by Anthem, helped identify more than 30,000 cases of diabetes through vision exams last year alone. That’s 30,000 more people who now know they need to control their blood sugar in order to prevent blindness, kidney damage, cardiovascular disease, painful neuropathy and a whole host of other health problems down the road.

Additionally, when the provider detects signs of diabetes, it can be reported back to Anthem via the vision claim and triggers enrollment into Anthem’s Diabetic Care Management to help patients get extra support. An American Optometry Association, Safeway Inc. study showed patients with diabetes who utilize their vision benefit can reduce future medical costs up to 20 percent. Also, a 2018 Anthem client case study found that connecting vision providers increased the reporting of high-risk health conditions like diabetes and high cholesterol through vision claims by 126 percent. That’s potentially 126 percent more incidents of earlier detection and earlier treatment to members.

What concerns do you have about your employees’ vision care? How might you use the suggestions here to proactively prevent vision problems down the road?