Many parents are surprised to find that we can routinely evaluate their child’s vision as early as 6 months of age. In fact, the American Optometric Association recommends your child’s first eye exam occur at 6 months of age. Our doctors are trained to perform a complete eye exam that requires little or no input from the patient. During your child’s examination, his or her eye alignment, prescription, and ocular health will be evaluated. Most exams will include eye dilation, which allows the doctor to get the most accurate results on a potential glasses prescription as well as to better visualize the internal health of the eyes.
Eye exams are very important for young children as many eye conditions have no symptoms and children don’t always report visual difficulties. Diagnosis and treatment of conditions such as strabismus and amblyopia have the best outcomes when found and treated early. The window of visual development is quite small. By age seven or eight our visual system is complete. Failure to detect and treat these conditions may result in permanent poor vision in one or both eyes for the child. Luckily, most conditions are successfully treated with early intervention.
The doctors at MEC welcome patients of all ages and love giving kids their first eye exams!
