The development of custom ordered progressive lenses has made significant advancements over the past decades. Progressive or ‘Multifocal’ glasses offered people the ability to have vision correction at distance, intermediate and near distance without the distinct lines in the lenses as in bifocals and trifocals. The early progressive lenses were of a ‘conventional’ design. Over the past 25 years progressive lens fabrication has continued to make major advancements. Conventional progressive lenses have developed into the digital progressive designs of today.
The advantage of a digital lens is that it allows for eye glass prescriptions to be calculated more precisely than conventional lenses as the final lens fabrication takes the frame information into account which becomes a compensated prescription.
Information taken into account for the final lens prescription includes the distance from the wearer’s face (vertex), the angle of frame (panto) and the curve of the frame (wrap). This allows for a more precise result in your custom eyewear when taken into account using the prescription provided by your optometrist. The advantage of the more precise prescription is this reduces the peripheral distortion and improves the overall clarity of vision for the wearer.
The progressive lenses we offer at our office are Hoya © which use a front and back side surfacing process that allows for thinner and lighter lens options. This technology assists to decrease peripheral distortion and provides a smoother transition between distances with less “swim effect”. Other advantages include to help your eyes work better together (binocular harmonization) and allows for larger reading areas.
In the ordering process for glasses at Discovery Optometry we use a digital measuring tool for the most precise measurements. Digital measuring systems reduce manual measurement mistakes to ensure repeatable and accurate results. The device we use is called an Optikam ©. The Optikam analyzes the frame position on the face to ensure lenses are aligned perfectly with the eyes. This reduces issues such as double vision, head tilting and looking through the wrong part of the lens. The measurements needed for glasses that the Optikam provides include:
- Pupillary distance (PD)
- Vertex distance
- Pantoscopic tilt
- Frame wrap
- Eye position in the frame
These measurements allow lenses to be customized specifically to the wearer and to improve the visual performance of the custom lenses. Digital lenses combined with modern measuring technology provide more precise, personalized, and comfortable vision correction compared to traditional methods.
Our goal is helping you to achieve your best possible vision. We achieve this by using the most up to date lens options on the market combined with digital measurement tools to ensure your prescription is as accurate and optimal for your custom eyewear.
