Regular exercise and a good diet can promote eye health and prevent vision loss. Not only does exercise have multiple health benefits, but it can also help prevent blindness.
Exercise can reduce many risks to our eyes from various medical conditions, such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and it may even help prevent vision loss from glaucoma and wet age-related macular degeneration.
Sight & Working Out
Physical activity improves tissue and organ oxygenation, decreases blood pressure, decreases lipid and cholesterol levels, helps our mood, and helps us fight obesity and osteoarthritis. In addition, exercise can improve insulin sensitivity and glycemic control in persons with type 2 diabetes mellitus, decrease low-density lipoprotein (bad cholesterol) and triglyceride levels, and increase high-density lipoprotein levels (good cholesterol).
Cardiovascular exercise can lower intraocular pressure and protect us if we suffer from glaucoma. Some of the best exercises that can lower intraocular pressure include walking, bicycling, Zumba, yoga, and using the elliptical machine.
These are anaerobic exercises that involve bending, straining, or Valsalva maneuvers.
People are at risk for wet age-related macular degeneration if they are overweight, smoke cigarettes, eat a high-fat diet, are over 50 years of age, have a positive family history of cardiovascular disease, high cholesterol, or wet age-related macular degeneration, or are Caucasian (white). Clinical studies have shown that exercise can lower the risk of wet age-related macular degeneration.
Eye Exercises
Eye exercises may be another form of physical exercise that may benefit your eyes. If practiced the right way, eye exercises can help prevent you from needing glasses or contact lenses.
Some simple eye exercises you can do at home include challenging your focus while in a stationary position by shifting your focus from near to far, following an imaginary figure eight for about 30 seconds and then reversing it, and taking a break every 20 minutes by looking at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds.
Regular exercise and a good diet can promote eye health and prevent vision loss. Exercise can reduce many risks to our eyes from various medical conditions and may even help prevent vision loss from glaucoma and wet age-related macular degeneration.
Eye exercises may also be beneficial in preventing the need for glasses or contact lenses. The key is to judge what is safe for you and find a physical activity you enjoy.
