Contact Lens Adaptation in Neophytes

Eye care professionals prescribe contact lenses to new wearers on a daily basis, and it is
common practice for practitioners to educate their patients to gradually increase their
contact lens wear time over their first few days of use; however, there is no scientific
basis in the literature for this practice. This study will compare the ocular health and
comfort of new contact lens wearers who are randomly assigned to begin contact lens wear with
increasing wearing time versus those who immediately start full-time wear (eight hours or
more/day). The increasing wearing time group will wear daily wear contact lenses (Acuvue
Oasys) for two, four, six, eight, and eight or more hours on the first, second, third,
fourth, and fifth days, respectively. The other group will be instructed to wear the same
contact lenses for eight or more hours per day, starting with the first day of wear. Both
groups of subjects will have their eye health and comfort evaluated at baseline, one, and two
weeks with a lighted-microscope and eye comfort surveys. Subjects will also keep a daily log
of eye comfort with a visual analog scale survey at home. All subjects will learn how to wear
and take care of contact lenses. They will also receive a prescription for contact lenses at
the conclusion if they wish to continue wearing the study contact lenses.