How to Insert a Scleral Lens

Contact lenses can be difficult to put in your eyes, but a scleral lens is even more challenging because the lens is bigger than regular contact lenses. Scleral lenses fit over the entire visible surface of the eye, which is very different from typical contact lenses that sit over the iris---the colored part of the eye. The Boston Foundation for Sight explains that scleral lenses are used to help prevent damage to the eye after surgery, injury or corneal transplant and to correct certain kinds of vision problems. Inserting a scleral lens is done with several simple steps.

Things You'll Need

• Mirror
• Towel
• Saline solution

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Instructions

Inserting a Scleral Lens

• 1

  Place a towel on your work surface and lay a small mirror on top of the towel. Use the thumb, index finger and middle finger of your insertion hand to form a tripod. Place the lens on top of the tripod.

• 2

  Fill the bowl of the lens with saline or the rinsing solution recommended by your eye care provider. Bend your head over the mirror and tuck your chin down toward your chest so that your face is parallel to the floor.

• 3

  Grasp your upper eye lid with the index finger of your free hand, holding the edge of the lid just under the lashes. Hold your lower eye lid open with your thumb and keep both of your eyes open as wide as possible. Look into the mirror as you place the scleral lens directly on the surface of your eye. Slowly let go of the upper lid and then the lower lid.