When your blurry vision is serious?

Many a times we experience blurry vision. Sometimes we don't pay much attention to it. Your eyes may be tired, you may need new glasses — or it may be a sign of a major health problem. Here we discuss about some common reasons and the action you need to take.

You need glasses

When your eye cannot focus in the right spot, you can often correct these "refractive errors" with eyeglasses, contact lenses, or minor surgery.

Your eyes may be tired

Have you been staring at a screen or page or focusing on a task for a long time? People tend to blink less often when they are concentrating like that. And each time you blink, you are spreading tears across the surface of your eye to keep it lubricated, clean, and refreshed. You may need to remind yourself to blink more often, take breaks, and look around to prevent vision fatigue.

You have diabetes

When your blood sugar is not well-controlled, fluid may seep into the lens of your eye and make it swell. This can happen before you are diagnosed or if you are changing your treatment, like starting insulin. As your glucose level gets back to normal, the lens should, too.

Your eye is inflamed

Eye tissue may swell because it has been bruised or something bad was splashed in it. The herpes virus from a cold sore could move to your eye. Immune system diseases that affect other parts of your body, like psoriasis, IBS, and rheumatoid arthritis, can also cause inflammation in your eye.

Your blood pressure is low

Feeling weak and dizzy, too? Your blood pressure might be too low because you are dehydrated — maybe from too much activity in the hot sun. Things like some medications, heart problems, poor nutrition, and hormone imbalances could also cause low blood pressure and related blurry vision.

Fluid is building up in your eye

That can put pressure on the optic nerve and damage it. If you are also seeing halos around lights, your eyes are very red and hurt a lot, and you feel queasy, you may have acute angle glaucoma. It develops very quickly, and you could lose your vision within a day if it is not treated.

A migraine is starting

About 1/4 of people who have migraines get visual auras, usually before the pain and for less than an hour. These range from shimmering zig-zag lines, sparkles, and flashes to blind spots and tunnel vision. It may seem like you are looking through water or cracked glass. If it happens only in one eye, see your doctor in case it is a serious problem.

You have a cataract

That is a cloudy area in the normally clear lens of the eye. They grow slowly, usually in both eyes, after age 55. But younger people, even kids, can get them, too. Colours may seem faded, it may be harder to see at night, and you may be more sensitive to glare. Special glasses and lens coatings can help you see. Surgery can replace the cloudy lens with a man-made one.

You are getting older

Starting around 40, you will notice that it is harder to focus on up-close tasks like reading. The clear lens inside your eye is not as flexible as younger people's. It is a normal part of aging. Your eye doctor can help you with reading glasses, contacts, or surgery.

You scratched your cornea

Typically, this feels like you have got a big, rough chunk in your eye. A corneal abrasion might be from an injury, but it is more likely from a bit of dust or sand. Try flushing your eye with clean water or eye wash. You can blink several times to make more tears, but don't rub or touch your eyeball. That could make it worse. See an eye doctor.

It is something in your brain

A concussion or brain injury could disrupt how information from your eyes gets processed. Depending where and how big it is, a brain tumor may affect your sight. Double vision can be one of many symptoms of brain swelling or of the membrane that surrounds it (encephalitis or meningitis), often because of infection.

Your retina is damaged

The retina is the back part of your eye where light gets focused, like a movie screen. If something happens to that surface, like swelling or tearing, the picture can be distorted or lost. Poor diet, smoking, previous eye injuries or disease, and health issues such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes can raise the odds of problems like macular edema and a detached retina.

You may have multiple sclerosis

Signals going from your eye to your brain have a harder time travelling through a swollen or damaged optic nerve. Vision trouble is often the first symptom of multiple sclerosis.

There is trouble with your pregnancy

Blurry vision along with headaches, shortness of breath, or feeling like throwing up may signal a serious complication called preeclampsia. It happens when blood vessels in your placenta are too narrow and don't work right. (Higher blood pressure after 20 weeks is usually the first sign.) See your doctor right away. Without treatment, it can cause life-threatening problems. Medications and rest until you deliver can help. 

Source: WebMD