The eye acts as our window to the outside world and allows us to experience an intense range of colors and varying light frequencies of the world around us.

However, like any other organ that generally deteriorates with age, the eye also begins to lose its ability to refract light and visualize objects as efficiently as it could once do before.

At times, if an aging person has a family history of eye disease or hasn’t taken care of their health, they could lose their vision, along with a stark degradation in their physical health.

Fortunately, modern research has shown that special supplements and the right kind of healthy diet can help either delay or completely prevent age-related eye diseases.

To learn more about what exactly age-related eye diseases are, how they impact an individual’s ability to see, how you get them, and the proper supplements help prevent such diseases, keep reading.

What Are Age-Related Eye Diseases?

When a person is still young, and their organs are still developing, their cells regenerate the fastest. This helps their organs retain their health, fight diseases, develop, and improve over time.

However, as a person gets older, their cells lose their natural ability to regenerate as quickly. As a result, wounds heal slower, it takes longer for the body to fight off an infection, and overall cognitive health declines.

The eye is one such organ that begins to show the earliest signs of aging. As a person ages, the muscles in their eyes and the optic nerves connected to the brain weaken.

Since these muscles need to refract the light entering your eyes, and the optic nerves are responsible for carrying the signals to the brain for the image to form, weakened muscles and nerves can impact the overall quality and efficiency of the entire system.

Moreover, due to the delay in this natural process, the person’s reflexes weaken, their ability to differentiate between distances, colors, and shapes declines, which reduces the effectiveness of their sight.

This is the primary reason the USA has state laws to limit the maximum legal age for a diving license’s renewal.

Furthermore, although such deterioration is generally common in most aging humans and animals, at times, the situation can worsen quite drastically.

This happens when the person has one or more age-related eye diseases.

These diseases can result in a rapid decline in the strength of the eye muscle, cause a thin membrane to grow over the lens, cause the eye’s natural pressure to increase dangerously, and even permanently destroy the optic nerves leading to the brain.

As a result, an older adult’s vision can become incredibly blurry, they might lose sight in one or both of their eyes, and they might have to invest in extensive eye surgeries to save whatever sight is left.

Common Signs that indicate the Presence of an Age-Related Eye Disease

As mentioned above, the eye is usually one of the first organs to show signs of aging and declining health. This is why it is common for most forty-year-olds to need glasses for reading or using their phone.

As a matter of fact, recent statistics show that nearly 4.2 million Americans aged above forty have compromised vision or are legally blind.

If you are forty and above, and you want to know whether you might have one or multiple age-related eye diseases, pay attention to the common signs and symptoms listed below.

• Blurred vision
• Distortedvision
• Inability to differentiatebetween different colors and shapes
• Inability to correctly judge how far or close an object is
• Difficulty seeing in dim lights
• Dry eyes
• Objects blending into backgrounds
• Bloodshot eyeballs
• A sensation of increasing pressure in one or both the eyeballs
• Glare sensitivity
• Drastic decline in the ability to read with and without glasses
• Drastic increase in the eyeball’s natural pressure

Types of Age-Related Eye Diseases Reported Across the World

It’s important to remember that it is completely natural for the quality of the eye’s vision to slightly decline over time.

However, if the decline is drastic and you feel a significant difference in your ability to see within just months, this can result from some age-related eye disease.

While poor practices, lack of proper nutrition, and extended periods of staring at a screen can lead to age-related eye disease, these diseases are also genetic.

Furthermore, while some of these diseases are curable with proper medication or surgery, some are untreatable and can only be prevented from further aggravation.

The most common types of age-related eye diseases reported across the globe are as follows:

• Age-related macular degeneration (AMD)
• Cataracts
• Diabetic retinopathy
• Glaucoma
• Dry eye

How do Age-Related Eye Diseases Impact Your Ability to See?

The human eye is undoubtedly one of the complex and unique organs in the body. Every part of the eye is extremely delicate and intricately designed to help the person view an image or object as clearly and vividly as possible.

However, when different age-related eye diseases weaken the iris muscles and the retinal cells or damage on the super sensitive optic nerves, the eye is no longer able to refract light properly, nor is it able to differentiate between different colors.

Moreover, different age-related diseases will impact the eye’s health and vision differently. It all comes down to how soon the disease is identified and how quickly one starts treatment.

This is how the different age-related eye diseases impact your ability to see:

● Age-related macular degeneration (AMD)

• This disease targets the person’s sharp, central vision and impacts their ability to drive or read.

● Cataracts

• Cataracts scatter or block the light passing through the eye’s lens. This prevents the brain from forming a clear image.

● Diabetic retinopathy

• When complications in diabetes lead to retinal damage, the disease can cause permanent blindness.

● Glaucoma

• This disease causes the eyeball’s pressure to increase drastically, which damages the optic nerves connecting the eye to the brain permanently.
• Although this disease can be managed and controlled with regular medication, there is no way to treat or reverse the blindness it causes.

What Causes Age-Related Eye Diseases?

As mentioned above, age-related eye diseases can result from having a family history or not paying attention to your diet or lifestyle.

Some of the most common causes of age-related eye diseases are as follows:

• Aging
• Having a family history of eye disease
• Using a blue light emitting mobile phone, laptop, or iPad for extended hours everyday
• Holding the blue light emitting device too closelyto your eyes
• Not using a blue light limiting filter or protector
• Not using proper spectacles despite having vision problems
• Overworking the eyes for extended periods
• Eating foods that don’t have the required nutritional content
• Not monitoring your diabetes and blood sugar levels
• Not taking any proper eye-related supplements throughout your life

Can You Prevent Age-Related Eye Diseases with Supplements?

According to global statistics, nearly 250 million people have some form of vision loss during their lifetime, most of which are age forty and above.

Although the hypothesis supporting the use of supplements and antioxidants to prevent age-related eye diseases has existed for a long time, it was not until recently that researchers proved a positive relationship between certain supplements and the prevention of age-related eye diseases.

Some of the supplements that have been clinically proven to help prevent or reverse the signs of different age-related eye diseases are as follows:

Lutein

Recently, Malaysian researchers have found that consuming supplements containing lutein, a xanthophyll that is only synthesized by green leafy vegetables and carrots, can decrease the risk of a person being affected by age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

Zeaxanthin

The consumption of zeaxanthin has been tested and proven to offer the same kinds of positive results as Lutein. Zeaxanthin is another organic pigment produced by saffron, corn, paprika, and other edible plants.

Bilberry Extract

Moreover, patients suffering from dry eye disease are proven to form natural eye moisture and have improved tear secretion after regularly consuming supplementary bilberry extract.

Oral Saffron Supplements

Supplements containing high amounts of organic saffron, such as aqueous saffron extract, are proven to have a protective effect in patients suffering from glaucoma.

When consumed orally every day for at least three to four weeks, the saffron extract can significantly reduce intraocular pressure, which will prevent any further damage to the connected optic nerves.

Dietary Zinc and Copper Supplements

Dietary zinc supplements are also excellent antioxidants proven to have a fantastic positive effect on an aged eye’s health. However, if you are already taking copper for eye health, make sure to consume a supplement that combines both.

Vitamin A, B1, B12 and Omega-3 Fatty Acids

Furthermore, other dietary supplements containing vitamin A, vitamin B1, vitamin B 12, and Omega-3 fatty acids are also clinically proven to help prevent a variety of different age-related eye diseases, along with restoring a damaged and aged eye.

Dietary Tips to Prevent Age-Related Eye Diseases

• Add a big portion of leafy green vegetables, including spinach, kale, Bok choy, etc., to your meals.
  • If you cannot find a way to eat enough spinach or kale every day, combine the two with other organic ingredients such as apples and berries to form a delicious breakfast smoothie.
• Consume root vegetables such as carrots and radishes every day. These vegetables are extremely rich in vitamin A, which can help both the developing as well as aging
• Moreover, eat a good portion of fish at least thriceevery week.
  • Not only is fish excellent for controlling blood cholesterol levels, but it can strengthen the eye muscles and help prevent the early signs of age-related eye diseases.
• Furthermore, if you are unable to find good quality fish every week, you can also consume one to two fish oil capsules every day.

Tips to Keep Your Eyes Healthy as You Age

• Since the sun is the biggest source of blue light, wear blue light limiting sunglassesevery time you leave your house or drive during the day.
• Invest in My Blue Protector’siPhone, iPad, and laptop filters.
• Limit your screen exposure to two to four hours every day.
• Try to view a blue light-emittingscreen from a distance.
• Adjust the brightness of your device’s screen when viewing it in dim lights.
• Keep your curtains closedduring the day to prevent excessive sunlight from entering your house
• Replace your LED bulbs with special lamps that emit lessblue light

Final Thoughts – Preserve Your Eyesight with My Blue Protector!

If you do not have a family history of different age-related eye diseases, taking special supplements can prevent your eye health from deteriorating over time.

To explore My Blue Protector’s excellent 360 eye supplements, click here