Specialty Contact Lenses

A Unique Fit for Your Unique Eyes

Many people can find fitting standard contact lenses challenging. A high prescription, irregular eye shape, or eye condition can make contacts uncomfortable or limit vision correction. Custom, specialty contact lenses can help patients achieve a more accurate fit and improved visual experience.

The base curve, diameter, and even the concentric ring pattern are designed for you. We use corneal topography to assess eye health and take custom measurements. After trying your initial pair, we can modify the fit, so you can feel confident and comfortable with your prescription lenses.

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Custom Soft Contact Lenses

Soft contact lenses are often considered more comfortable and easier to adapt to than RGP or hard lenses. Yet, soft contacts can be limited in providing sharper vision for people with irregular eye shapes or high prescriptions.

Custom soft contact lenses can improve vision for conditions incompatible with standard lenses. Corneal topography can help us accurately capture details of the corneal surface, including any uneven curves, scars, or growths. Additionally, the lens is manufactured to fit your eye measurements, like curvature, diameter, and pupil size.

Aspheric Lenses

Aspheric contact lenses, like high-index lenses for glasses, are thinner than standard lenses. The contact lenses have a flatter curve, resulting in a slimmer appearance. Patients with low or high prescriptions can benefit from less bulk. The lenses can also adapt more comfortably to the eye’s surface, for a smoother feel.

Standard contact lenses can sometimes cause a bug-eyed (magnified) or beady-eyed (minification) appearance. With aspheric lenses, there’s less distortion for you and anyone looking at your eyes.

Another benefit over standard lenses is the lack of spherical aberration. When light passes through a standard or spherical lens, light may enter through different points. The lack of specific focus can affect the clarity of your sight.

Imagine holding your hand under a flowing tap. Most of the water might flow over your fingers, but some might splash over your palm. Similarly, light reaches the eye directly in the center of the lens, but some light may enter peripherally (the sides). Aspheric lenses help prove more precise focus, supporting sharper vision by reducing aberrations.

Aspheric lenses can offer a clearer alternative to standard lenses for many patients. However, as the lenses are thinner, some patients with corneal irregularities or high astigmatism may be a poor fit. Talk to Dr. Simms to see if aspheric lenses may benefit you.

Toric Lenses

Toric lenses have unique features for patients with astigmatism—a vision problem caused by an irregular cornea or lens shape, where the curves are mismatched. With myopia (nearsightedness) and hyperopia (farsightedness), only one focal distance is affected. Myopia only affects far or distant vision, while hyperopia is the opposite. But astigmatism can affect near and far vision.

The uneven tissue surface can also make fitting a contact lens more challenging. If the lens shifts or moves, it can significantly impact how effectively vision is corrected. Toric lenses help eliminate the visual distortions caused by accidental shifts or movement. Weighted or thicker zones help prevent rotation and the lens maintains an accurate position even when you blink.

As people with astigmatism can experience decreased near and distance vision, toric lenses can help correct both. Toric lenses have 2 focal powers to help refocus light, like a multifocal contact lens.Toric lenses are available as soft or RGP (rigid gas permeable) contact lenses. However, soft toric contact lenses are more common. The availability of a soft contact option allows people with astigmatism more flexibility when fitting their lens style.

Multifocal Contact Lenses

A multifocal lens has multiple prescription powers for improving vision at multiple distances. For example, bifocals have 2 prescription powers, usually for correcting near and far vision. Progressive lenses seamlessly transition from near to far (including correction for middle distances).

Multifocal contact lenses are designed with a concentric ring pattern—like a bullseye, with near distance correction in the middle and an outer ring for far distance. The position mimics how we naturally see—our pupil widening for distance vision and narrowing for close vision.

Pupil size in adults is generally 2–4 mm when narrow (and in bright light) and 4–8 mm when expanded (or in the dark). The size and position of your pupil within the lens can impact the clarity of your vision. Therefore, we take individual measurements, manufacturing your lenses with the pupil centered for optimal vision.

Custom multifocal contact lenses are disposable monthly or quarterly.

Scleral Lenses

Scleral contact lenses feature a larger diameter designed to vault over the cornea and fit on the sclera (white of the eye). The lens creates a regular surface shape, which is essential for people with an irregular cornea shape. The result is clear, distortion-free vision!

The lens is a type of gas-permeable or “hard” contact lens. The materials allow oxygen to pass through the eye.

Scleral lenses offer 3 critical benefits:

A fluid reservoir inside the lens helps keep the eye moist, comfortable, and healthy.
The smooth ocular surface provides clear, crisp vision for people who are a poor fit for standard contacts.
The customized lenses fit beneath the eyelids and rest on the sclera, offering improved comfort and stability.

When you receive scleral lenses from us, we’ll teach you how to insert and remove the lenses. Here’s what you can expect:

Who Can Scleral Lenses Help?

We use computer-based topography to capture individual eye measurements and manufacture your lenses. As a result, your scleral lenses can fit you accurately. The fit can help restore vision for people with irregular corneas and conditions such as:

Dry eye
Corneal epithelial defects
High astigmatism
Keratoconus
Post-LASIK or RK ectasias

Our Overview of Scleral Lenses

Blocking Blue & UV Light

When you wear lenses every day, your contacts should keep up with your lifestyle. Lens features can help you transition smoothly from indoor to outdoor environments, so you experience comfortable vision with changing lighting.

In addition to blocking UV light from the sun, your contact lenses can protect your eyes from blue light. Most people spend their days engaging with digital devices, like phones, computers, tablets, or TVs. These devices emit blue light.

Blue light can be harmful in significant amounts. We also tend to hold blue-light-emitting screens close to our eyes, adding the risk of closer and prolonged exposure. Our eyes can filter out many harmful light forms, but cannot keep out blue light. As a result, blue light contributes to the risk of digital eye strain, sleep deprivation, and macular degeneration.

Lens materials and coatings can help protect our eyes, blocking the harmful light properties of UV and blue light.

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Visit Us for Lens Options

At Urban Optique & Eyecare, we are committed to providing an exceptional eye care experience. Whether you need specialty lenses or standard lenses with specialty features, we can help. Visit us today to get started with a customized fit.

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Specialty Contact Lenses

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Myopia Management

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Overnight Vision Correction

See More with Optomap Retinal Exams

At Urban Optique & Eyecare, we are proud to offer specialty technology for effective, and efficient eye care services.

We offer the Optomap retinal exam as an important part of our eye exams. Optomap produces an image that is as unique as your fingerprint and provides your doctor with valuable insight into your eyes.

Optomap allows us to see over 80% of your retina, which means we can get more information about the health of your eyes. And because many eye conditions can develop without symptoms, Optomap is a great tool in the detection and prevention of long-term vision and ocular damage.

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