If you do notice eye or vision symptoms it is important to seek an immediate appointment. Make sure you describe your problem as clearly as possible and when you first noticed it and we will endeavour to fit you in on the same day for a quick bulk billed appointment.

Our normal eye examination always includes advice on how to maintain good eye health. Where appropriate we will give you written instructions on how to prevent various eye or vision problems occurring.

Optometry is a primary health service which means you don’t need a referral to have your eyes tested.  A full eye check examination is generally recommended every 2 years. As well as checking your vision and providing a correct script or exercises if required, this should include a pupil dilation examination.  Its purpose is to fully examine the back of your eyes.  Even if your vision is fine, there are a number of life threatening diseases that can be identified by such an examination as well as a number of sight threatening conditions.  Since many eye problems don’t have obvious symptoms in their early stages, it is important to conduct routine tests which can offer early diagnosis and treatment.  It left untreated vision losses can usually not be restored.

Recently the World Health Organisation has identified the alarming increase in people, mostly children, who are becoming short sighted.  Distance vision becomes less sharp and even if corrected by glasses, contact lenses or surgery there is often an ongoing worsening of distance vision.  This is caused by the eyeball becoming longer and this in turn causes an increased risk of serious eye diseases as the years go by.  This looks like becoming a major health risk in the future if it is not controlled.  Fortunately there are a number of ways of reducing the risk of onset of myopia and of controlling its progression once it has set in.  At maximeyes we specialise in these preventative strategies.

Our principal optometrist, Max, has been using Ortho-K as a means of slowing and preventing myopia, especially in children, since beginning the practice in Manly.  In the early days is was not accepted that Ortho-K had any effect on myopic progression and it was mostly used for its other benefit of freeing short sighted persons from the need to wear glasses or contact lenses or undergo surgery.  Max noticed that children who did Ortho-K did not progress myopically. They were corrected by Ortho-K lenses worn overnight and obtained good distance vision all day without need for correction. It is now well accepted that Ortho-K slows myopic progression and, in some cases, prevents it altogether, thereby reducing the increased risk of many eye problems associated with myopia.

Many other optometry practices now offer Ortho-K but few if any have the same depth of experience that Max brings to each case.

We are always enthusiastic to encourage therapies which although not normally used, have been shown to benefit eye health, especially when these therapies have no known negative side effects. For this reason, we promote the use of saffron to treat early and late age-related macular degeneration (AMD) as well as anti-oxidants indicated by the latest research (AREDS 2). We also recommend simple diet changes.

Virtual Reality with variable eye input is used to treat a variety of binocular and other visual problems. Specialty contact lenses are used to treat ocular diseases and also to change the colour of eyes as desired. Ortho-K is a major speciality service and is described next.