Everything You Need To Know About Your Child’s First Visit To The Eye Doctor
Regular comprehensive eye exams are key to maintaining your family’s eye health and recognizing eye conditions in their early stages. This is especially important for your child, so our optometrists have created this useful guide for parents about children’s eye exams.
Why Are Children’s Eye Exams Important?
Eyes and sight play a very important role in early learning, helping your child to acquire valuable basic skills like the ability to focus, use hand/eye coordination, to follow movement with their eyes, use the eyes binary functions and develop peripheral sight. These skill sets are vital to learning everything from reading and writing to different sports, so it’s important to catch any visual problems as early as possible in order to ensure that your child develops to his or her full potential.
When Should I Start Taking My Child For Eye Exams?
The American Optometric Association recommends that your child’s first eye exam take place at about 6 months of age to ensure that he or she is reaching these important milestones. If your child’s vision is on track, additional eye exams are recommended at age 3 and then at age 5 or 6. If your child has no problems with his or her vision, a check up every 2 years is advised.
How To Prepare Your Child For Their First Eye Exam
First of all, it is important to Choose An Eye Doctor Who Is A Specialist In Pediatric Optometry. This ensures that you have the best eye doctor for your children and that the practice is comfortable and child-friendly.
Try to schedule your appointment for a time when your child is most likely to be alert and happy, as this will make it easier to make the experience a positive one and make the exam itself short and easy. When you go in for your appointment, talk to your child about all the new things he or she is seeing and doing, keeping it fun and upbeat.
Since this is your child’s first visit, make a list of any questions or concerns you’d like addressed. Also make notes of your child’s medical history that your doctor will be interested in – for example, if he or she was premature, is prone to eye rubbing or has poor eye tracking skills.
Our Vision Center Offers Friendly, Comprehensive Children’s Eye Exams
Eyes on Brickell offers the extensive services of a professional network of eye specialists and opticians in Brickell and other Miami locations for you and your children. Our team is friendly, welcoming and happy to assist you in making your child’s visit an enjoyable experience. The health insurance providers we currently accept at our vision center include Medicare, Vision Service Plan (VSP), Opticare, Eye Med Vision Care and many more. To find out more about our practice, please contact us today at one of our locations.
