What are polarised lenses?
Normally, sunlight is scattered in all directions. However, when light strikes flat or smoother surfaces, the reflected light beams often travel in a more uniform and usually horizontal direction, causing glare. Glare can be especially uncomfortable and irritating when driving during sunrise or sunset hours, skiing or snowboarding, fishing or even just taking a stroll at the beach.
Polarised lenses are lenses with a specialised filter that only selectively allows vertically oriented light to pass through whilst blocking horizontally oriented light. This eliminates the amount of reflective light entering the eye and reduces glare to provide more comfortable and clearer vision.
What’s the difference between polarised and non-polarised lenses?
Non-polarised lenses do not reduce glare, but rather only darken the perception of sunlight or reflective light. On the other hand, polarised lenses target reflected wavelengths of light responsible for glare.
Here are 5 key benefits of polarised lenses:
- Provides clearer, sharper and more comfortable vision.
- Reduces glare from reflective surfaces such as roads, water, sand and snow.
This means you can drive comfortably and enjoy hobbies such as fishing, or sports such as snowboarding or beach volleyball without squinting your eyes!
- Protects the eye from UV rays
UV rays are highly damaging to our eyes and can increase our risk of developing diseases such as macular degeneration, which is a leading cause for vision loss. UV rays can also lead to cataracts and even sunburns on our eyes (photokeratitis).
- Great for light-sensitive people, including post-cataract surgery patients.
- Available in prescription and non-prescription sunglasses
At Eyecare Network, you can enjoy the benefits of prescription polarised sunglasses in three different coloured lenses – grey, brown or green.
How can you tell if your current sunglasses are polarised?
You can determine whether your sunglasses are polarised or not by holding them in front of a digital device, such as your phone, and rotating them by about 90 degrees. If the screen darkens, this means your sunglasses are polarised. Non-polarised sunglasses will remain the same no matter how they are rotated.
If you are interested in prescription polarised sunglasses, please contact us on 9728 7288 to speak to one of our lovely optical dispensers.
