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Advice on blurred vision please!

H

Hope55

Member
Messages
5
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Tablets (oral)
Hi All

I was diagnosed as T2 on the 15th of February following a blood test I was keen to take as over the last month my vision had being blurred.
Went to opticians a week prior to that and they did all the tests and came up negative for diabetes and prescribed me glasses for driving and watching television. (Expensive mistake!)
I was prescribed Metformin and have been taking 500g in the morning since the 18th Feb, so just over a week.
I have been on the 8 week Blood Sugar diet for a week and started exercising also (I am roughly 1.5 stone overweight)

Fasting blood glucose was 11.9 on the 18th February and have now got it down to 5.0.
My question is...my eyesight has got WORSE over the last few days - worse than when I was 11.9. At 11.9 I was short-sighted and this has now switched to being long-sighted, which is way worse for PC work and reading.

Has anyone else had the same experience? Will it settle and if so how long does it take?

Many thanks!

Hope
 
Hi. It’s not abnormal for the eyes to encounter problems when glucose concentrations drop following diagnosis. Mine got so bad when my sugars fell off a cliff that I had to have laser surgery and then anti-VEGF injections. A little blurring is somewhat normal in your position, but if you have any concerns then you should seek assistance. Eyes are incredibly sensitive to diabetes and you shouldn’t take any chances. Best of luck, I’m sure things will settle down soon enough.
 
The way this was explained to me (although this may be grossly simplified) is...
When our BG is high, our body tries to get rid of the excess sugar. This is one reason why one of the symptoms of high BG is going to the toilet a lot. Another symptom may be tooth decay as the sugar is coming out through our saliva.
It also comes out through our tear ducts (my tears tasted sweet rather than salty when I was first diagnosed). This means the water our lens need to focus through has a different focal length so our lens adjust for this. As our BG comes down, especially if it comes down quickly, the lens takes some time to adjust back to normality.
This is what causes the blurred vision.

One of the things you will keep reading with regard to diabetes is "we are all different". What works for one person causes a problem for another. What takes a few days to recover for one person may take a few weeks for someone else.
I know this is not a great answer to your question but it is hard to tell how long it will take for your eyes to recover.

Some people buy cheap ready readers to temporarily correct their eyesight whilst waiting for the lens recovery.
I know you can get OK ones from Poundland for £1.

Finally, well done on getting your BG down.
 
It took about 4 months for my eyesight to get back to normal. It seemed like s VERY long 4 months and I was buying reading glasses from the pound shop during that time.

Luckily I had an optician who was himself diabetic and it was him that advised that I should buy the pound shop glasses until my sight settled. I was so impressed by his thoughtfulness that I always recommend him to everyone and he has had a lot of additional business through my recommendations.
 
When blood glucose levels are high, glucose enters the lens and changes it's focal length. As you bring your blood glucose levels down, the lens returns to normal but it may takes several weeks. In the meantime, ready-readers should improve your near vision. If the ready-readers don't help at all, go back to your optician and explain the problem to them.
 
You may get several adjustments over time as the eye lenses settle down. If there was a TV advert that exaggerated the swelling of the eyes and the effective blindness as a complication of this condition, it might help like the cigarette adverts.
 
Thank you so much for this - looks like I am going to Poundland!
 
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