New Year, New YOU!

New Year, NEW YOU! That is the motto I have developed for 2017 in our office. I feel like with all the New Year’s Resolutions being made and commitments to “get healthier”, “lose weight”, “take better care of yourself”, why not include your precious eyesight on that list? If you ask someone which sense they would be the most devastated to lose, the majority of respondents would say their vision. Well of course! Your sight is responsible for your view of your beautiful children, your independence to drive, the freedom to go see a movie at the theater. Yet time and time again, when I speak with people it has been years since they last had their eyes examined. It is a tough thing for me to understand sometimes why the things we value most are the ones that are the most neglected. Obviously I am passionate about vision, but I am also passionate about people taking care of their WHOLE self. Do you realize all that an optometrist can see during a eye health examination? Aside from ocular diseases like macular degeneration or glaucoma, we also can see health conditions like high blood pressure, diabetes or high cholesterol. For those of you immediately writing this off because you don’t have these conditions, optometrist can also see things like brain tumors and cancer during a routine eye exam, even when a patient may be asymptomatic. No joke, I found a pituitary tumor on a patient with no symptoms. So the bottom line of this post, is a call to action. Make an eye exam a part of your 2017 Resolutions. Check it off your list, feel good knowing that your eyes are healthy and that you are taking good care of yourself.

Cheers to a New Year and a NEW YOU!! Rebekah Noss Lynch, O.D.