7 Ways To Protect Your Eyes This Summer

1. Sport Larger Sunglasses

Invest in a pair of sunglasses that have wrap-around frames or buy wide rimmed sunglasses to protect your eyes in summer. Make sure they provide proper UV protection and keep eyes away from the dangers of UV exposure.

2. Reduce Sun Exposure

The sun's ultraviolet rays pose many health concerns, including cataracts. This is why it is important to take precautions to shield your eyes. Wear a large sun hat or visor when you step out in the sun. Even in shade, UV rays remain a persistent problem; so, keep that hat and sunglasses on.

3. Apply Sunblock 

Sunblock protects the skin from harm but it can also be a cause for concern if you haphazardly apply it. You must make sure not to apply sunblock too close to the eyes as it can enter the eye and cause irritation.

4. Eat a Healthy Diet

There are certain foods that can be quite helpful for your eyes in summer. You need to add eye-boosting vitamins and minerals into your diet, particularly lutein and zeaxanthin along with vitamin C, vitamin E and omega fatty acids.

5. Drink More Water

The reasons to drink more water are endless. Keeping yourself properly hydrated during hot summer days protects your eyes from dehydration. Keep a water bottle in your hand at all times.

6. Exercise Daily

Exercise provides instant benefits for the body and mind. A study in the British Journal of Ophthalmology suggests that those with an active lifestyle are 70 percent less likely to develop macular degeneration. Exercise to keep your entire body (eyes included) in good shape.

7. Go for an Eye Exam

Even if you have an impeccable vision, you should still schedule an eye check-up. Eyes can tell a lot about your overall health and the doctor can detect a broad array of health conditions that you might not even be suspecting to be suffering from.

Credit goes to Onlymyhealth

 http://www.onlymyhealth.com/health-slideshow/8-ways-to-protect-your-eyes-this-summer-1430211601.html

Update!

I was accepted to Nova's Optometry class of 2020! Awesome right?! I finally get to go to my dream school and stay here in South Florida! The decision was a little tough, choosing between ICO and Nova was hard. Chicago would have been a new adventure and it would be have a new experience, but, I'm glad I chose Nova. I get to stay close to home, pay less tuition(which means less loans!!!) and in the end I plan to practice in South Florida anyways. So now you get to read all about my experiences at NSU which, i am sure will be very exciting!

Working as a Retina Tech

Retinal tears, holes, detachments oh my! My experiences working as a retina tech..

I've had the wonderful opportunity to intern as a retina tech over the past year and a half. During this time I have seen and learned about some really cool things! If you woke me up in the middle of the night and asked me what macular degeneration was or how floaters and flashes are caused, you bet I could answer you! Before I even began working as a retina tech I was shy, quiet and nervous when it came to interacting with people. It was pretty bad, I was even nervous when I had to call Pizza Hut to order a pizza! But now I bring patients into the room and I can confidently talk to them and interact with them. I've learned how to perform refractions, check a patients vision and pressure, numb their eye before an injection, perform diagnostic tests such as FA'S, OCT'S and even B-scans (ultrasounds). In fact, just yesterday I did a Bscan on a patient and got to see something really cool, a retinal detachment! I've seen quite a few of these, but this one was a mac off detachment in the right eye. Pretty cool right? (But not so cool for the patient!)

 This job has definitely taught me a lot about ocular diseases which is something I plan to focus on as an optometrist. It's scary how much information I have absorbed just by listening to the doctors talk to their patients. I know that a lot of these experiences will come in handy over the next 4 years, something I definitely look forward to! 

A New Perspective

A New Perspective

5 years ago if you had asked me where I see myself today I probably would have said that I would be in dental school. For as long as I can remember I wanted to be a dentist. Crazy right? Things began to change during my year off after I finished my masters degree. I had applied to dental school 2 times by this time and was in the process of applying a third time, it felt like a cycle that kept repeating its self. I would interview, get waitlisted and then never hear back. I began to start losing hope. So I decided I wasn't going to sit around for another year. I agreed to work at an Ophthalmologist/Retina Specialists office as a technician. Little did I know, this was going to be  a life changing decision for me. I would be learning everything from how to answer the phones to working up patients. It was scary, it was something new. No more working with teeth, no more x-ray's or assisting during fillings, root canals and extractions. Now I would be answering phones, checking a patients vision, dilating their eyes, numbing patients for injections and so much more. 

After a few months working at this new job, I began to realize the importance of vision. I mean, I always knew how vital it was to our lives. I had been wearing glasses since the age of 7, contacts since I was 12 and I'm myopic, oh and macular degeneration runs in my family. So don't get me wrong, I was always familiar with optometry and what it meant to be an eye doctor. But I never realized how much I could enjoy it, how it was actually a perfect fit for me. I started becoming more and more passionate about eyes.  I took interest in looking through the slit lamp and learning how to refract. I  even learned how to do visual fields, oct's, fa's, bscans and so much more! As I learned each new skill, I fell in love with eyeballs. So that was it, I knew I had to apply to optometry school. It was already mid July by now, I was still in the middle of a dental school application cycle (dental school had basically become a backup plan by now). So I had a huge list of things I had to start doing, take my OAT'S, start the application, write a personal statement, get recommendation letters and shadow an optometrist. Somehow by October I had accomplished all of this. I went to work every day, studied for my OAT and prepared my optometry school application. It was the craziest, most stressful 4 months of my life. I took my OAT in October and shadowed some amazing optometrists. During my entire shadowing experience I felt so comfortable, I felt like I belonged, something I never felt while being in a dental office. Shadowing solidified my decision to apply to optometry school even more. Now, since it was already late October I had a bad feeling. I thought to myself, what if it's too late to apply? What if I don't get in? What if they don't interview me because I wanted to be a dentist before? Boy was I wrong.

On a bright sunny day in November I got an email from PCO. My first Optometry Interview! I couldn't believe it, was this really happening? I scheduled the interview for December 4th. So I got on my plane and flew to Pennsylvania. At this point I was freaking out, everything just felt so unreal. I remember getting to the campus and seeing all the other students in my interview group. Everyone was so nice and friendly. We all went on a tour and I began to realize how familiar everything looked. it looked just like our office, every machine and instrument they showed us was something I already knew how to use. I can really do this, I started to realize. I got more excited throughout the day and felt great after my interview. Two weeks later I got the best news I would get in a while, my first acceptance to optometry school! I was overwhelmed with joy, honestly couldn't believe it, I finally had a future! Finally, I was going to be doing something with my life. I had my second interview in another month at ICO, and 2 weeks later I was accepted there as well. It was the best news I had gotten in a long time. All those long hours of studying had finally paid off. Every patient experience and skill I had learned working as a technician would prepare me for the challenges in optometry school, it was all worth it.  After a lot of thinking and making a huge list of pro's and con's I chose to be a part of Illinois College of Optometry's class of 2020.  Yup, I'm moving from Florida to Chicago! I will get to finally see snow! And I know... I am going to freeze!

So I guess it's safe to say that I definitely do not want to be a dentist anymore! I wish I had realized I wanted to become an optometrist sooner, but the long path it took me to get me to this point has just made me work each step of the way. Does it hurt a little when I drive by a dental office? Yeah it does, but when I see an optometrists office I get super excited, and I start imagining how that's going to be me one day, and I really can't wait!! 

Welcome!

If you're here I am going to assume you're either an Optometry student or someone interested in Optometry, or maybe you're just bored and want to read some new material...anyways welcome to my blog! I'm pretty new at this so bear with me.

 So what's the point of this blog? Well, I wanted to create a place where I could share my experiences while I go through Optometry school. I will be blogging about all the up's and down's throughout school the next four years as well as all the steps it took to get me to this point (application process, the OAT, shadowing..all that good stuff).  Hopefully I will be able to give you some helpful advice and tips on how to survive this crazy exciting journey.  For those of you that don't know me, I was born and raised in South Florida. In my free time I pretty much binge watch Netflix and Hulu, I also love dancing and watching Bollywood movies. Oh and is shopping considered a hobby? I also enjoy baking and cooking..maybe I can include some fun recipes on this blog. But anyways back to the point of this blog.. I didn't actually decide (more like had an epiphany) to become an Optometrist until very recently (more about that later...). It's been a long, complicated journey for me since I graduated from my undergrad and masters. Luckily, things are looking a lot better now and I couldn't be more excited about this new career choice! So I hope that I can share some valuable information with you and at the same time hopefully you can learn a little about me too.