Below you will find a few tips to ensure that, while you are carrying out near vision tasks, you always maintain a correct visual posture.

FOR READING AND WRITING:

  • Write or read at a lectern or at a table with an inclination of 20 degrees, so that your posture is more relaxed, there is less visual tension and breathing is easier.
  • Keep the study room well aired and at a normal temperature.
  • Sit properly. The seat has to allow you to keep your back straight and have your feet flat on the floor or on a stand.
  • Posture: Feet must touch the ground, legs have to bend at right angles and back must touch the seatback.
    It is recommended that the desk is slightly tilted (15º and 20º).
  • Don’t work at a too high table and don’t read or write too close to the text neither. You must respect the right reading distance from the elbow to the centre of the middle finger.
  • Never incline the sheet while reading or writing. Inclination of over 20 degrees will mean the functional elimination of an eye.
  • Don’t move your head while reading.
  • When working take breaks every 15 or 20 minutes looking at far objects in order to relax your sight.
  • Place the desk in front of a window or an open space, never facing a wall.
  • Whenever possible, work with natural light and use artificial light when the sun starts setting.
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  • Time: When studying it is suitable to take a 2 minutes break every 30 minutes, looking far away, if possible through a window.
  • Illumination: It must be uniform.
    The work area should have twice the environment light, but an ambient light is needed.
    The lamp should be placed to the left for right-wing people and to the right for those leftists.
  • Working distance: Between the eyes and the paper there must be at least the distance existing between the elbow and the tip of the index finger (between 30 and 40 cm).
    To the computer the ideal distance is about 50 cm.

WHEN WATCHING TELEVISION:

  • Do not sit too close to the set: television is a set prepared for far vision. The optimal distance must be three times the television set diagonal at least.
  • Keep always ambience lighting. Never watch it with any light.
  • While watching television be aware of your surrounding objects.
  • Do not watch television when lying on the sofa or in bed or with crocked head. All these postures prevent information to arrive the same to both eyes.
  • Do not let children watch television more than two hours a day.

TO WORK AT THE COMPUTER:

Besides, you will have to keep the screen free of any kind of reflections (fluorescent lights or windows). Place the keyboard always under the screen and the text at the same level as the screen. Keep the same distance from the keyboard, the text and the screen to the eyes. Never place the keyboard or the text at a side of the screen. At long term it causes a general malaise that translates into backache, headache and visual stress.

OTHER TIPS:

  • Do sport and outdoor activities.
  • Do not wear graduated glasses for long distance sight or for near tasks whereas it is possible.
  • Now and then close your eyes and imagine distant images and situations.
  • Maintain a proper diet:
    • Do not abuse of coke, meat, milk, coffee or any other kind of stimulant
    • Increase consumption of green vegetables like spinaches.

All these tips help to minimize visual stress that we accumulate due to bad working conditions. If we do not control them, this may lead to different visual problems like the emergence and development of myopia.