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The primary function of your eye is to focus light. You need glasses or contacts when your eye cannot properly direct light rays on the retina. The cornea, at the front of your eye, provides most of the eye's focusing power. The lens inside your eye provides the fine tuning of light, contributing to your ability to read. Light rays must focus precisely on the retina for you to see clearly. If you wear corrective lenses, you may have one of the following common refractive problems:


Myopia
	Myopia is the medical term for nearsightedness. More than 70 million people in the United States are myopic. Myopia occurs when an eye is too long for the cornea's curvature. Light rays entering the eye do not come to a sharp focus on the retina at the back of the eye. Instead, they focus further forward, producing a blurred image

Hyperopia

Hyperopia is the medical term for farsightedness. This occurs when an eye is too short for the cornea's curvature. Light rays entering the eye focus behind the retina, and as a result a blurred image is produced.


Astigmatism
	Many patients with myopia (nearsightedness) or hyperopia (farsightedness) have some degree of astigmatism, or ovalness to their cornea. Astigmatism occurs when the cornea is more oblong than spherical. As a result, patients with astigmatism experience distortion or tilting of images because of unequal bending of light rays entering the eye.


Presbyopia

Presbyopia is the normal aging process of the eye, where its natural lens loses some of the flexibility that allows it to fine tune the focusing of light. This usually occurs between the ages of 40 and 50. Everyone experiences presbyopia at some point as they get older, resulting in nearsighted people to begin wearing bifocals in their forties, and those who never needed glasses before may require reading glasses.