Masterton optometrist issues novelty lens warning

A MASTERTON optometrist has written a warning brochure about novelty contact lenses, which cost an Auckland man his sight in one eye.
Ross Taylor of Vision Specialists produced the brochure to warn of the dangers of carelessly using contact lenses, which he says should all be registered as medical devices.
Mr Taylor said contact lenses are only treated as medical devices when they are have been prescribed, but, "eye infections and bacteria don't know the difference; the risk factors are exactly the same."
Mr Taylor has made the brochures available to Vision Specialists customers, and also to nearby gift shop The Sanctuary.
Staff at the Sanctuary, which sells coloured lenses for $49.95 or $59.95, confirmed they had received Mr Taylor's brochure.
The lenses come in small bottles of clear liquid. When optometrists prescribe lenses, "they are ethically and legally obliged to ensure people know how to use them," Mr Taylor said, but "prepackaged contact lenses can be sold by anybody".
Mr Taylor said some of these prepackaged lenses came with care instructions, but others did not.
"(People) are not told how to clean them. They are not told there are special solutions."
Mr Taylor's brochure recommends that lenses be fitted by an optometrist or ophthalmogist, that they be cleaned with a special solution, and that they not be shared.
"They aren't just something you can put in your eye and forget about."
Vision Specialists will order novelty contact lenses, but Mr Taylor said he does this "with a recommendation that eyes be examined first, and the lenses fitted properly".
"Eyes are fairly intolerant," Mr Taylor said, and while chances of infection were only one in 40,000, "the consequence of that severe an infection is blindness."
Mr Taylor said optometrists had tried to have "all contact lenses classified as a medical device", which meant they would only be available through professionals.
Instead the Ministry of Health concluded prepackaged and coloured lenses were not medical devices.
"Now we see the result."
Mr Taylor said he does not know how common the novelty lenses are, but professional friends in Auckland and elsewhere told stories of people swapping the coloured contact lenses around at parties.
"That's high risk."
Swapping contact lenses could spread eye infections and other diseases, such as AIDS and Hepatitis C, which can be spread through tears.