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Spectacle Lenses
We invite you to experience the standard we set in Issaquah for expertise and selection in ophthalmic lenses. Each of our opticians personally tests advancements in lens brands and features for meaningful innovations that best suit your expectations of lens functionality, and durability.
Lenses and Lens Features Terminology
Anti-reflective. (AR) coatings improve your vision by significantly reducing annoying reflections on the surface of your lenses. They enhance your appearance by eliminating glare and bright spots in the lenses. Anti-reflective coatings decrease unwanted reflections from overhead office lights, sunshine, and car headlights. AR coatings smooth the surface of the lens and allow more light to be transmitted through the lens, resulting in sharper images. High quality AR coatings are more scratch resistant and easier to clean. At Issaquah Vision, we have selected Alizé non-glare lenses due to their excellence in function and durability.
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Aspheric Lenses. Aspheric lenses permit thinner designs through advanced computer design technology. The result is a thinner lens design and decreased weight of the lens. Aspheric lenses can offer outstanding comfort, plus cosmetic and optical benefits.
fig. a  fig. b 
(fig. a) This typical lens creates visual distortion and uneven magnification. (fig. b) An aspheric lens eliminates visual distortion and makes a high powered lens more attractive.
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Bifocal and Reading Glasses. Bifocal and reading only glasses are commonly used for certain activities such as computer use in cubicle settings, reading in bed or reading while doing other activities requiring clear distance vision e.g. TV watching. Bifocal and reading glasses give a wide area for reading with minimal distortion.
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Computer Lenses. Computer lenses are advanced progressive addition lenses which enable you to comfortably view your monitor in a proper ergonomic head posture, and allow you to read at closer distances at the same time. Proper focus, head angle, and correct ergonomic placement of your computer monitor will decrease eyestrain, neckache, backache and decrease stress headaches.
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High Index. High index lenses can efficiently focus light while decreasing the weight of higher powered prescriptions. There are many high index lenses available. Our opticians will help you to determine if high index lenses are appropriate for you, and if so, which type would be best for your prescription and frame size choice.
While many high index lenses are also aspheric, not everyone is suited to wear them due to bothersome blur when looking away from the center of the lenses. Our licensed opticians are trained to diagnose such problems and are able to customize high index lens designs to exclude asphericity when indicated.
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Impact resistant lenses: Trivex/Polycarbonate. Trivex lenses are plastic lenses that are extremely light and strong. This lens material can replace older polycarbonate lenses due to its superior scratch resistance and optical quality. Approximately ten times more impact- resistant than conventional plastic lenses, Trivex lenses are also thinner than conventional plastic and are attractively priced. We recommend Trivex lenses for those with moderate prescriptions seeking lightweight lenses.
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Photochromic. Photochromic lenses change from light to dark and back again depending upon their exposure to ultraviolet or UV light. Photochromic lenses are available in a wide array of plastic materials that turn grey or brown. These lenses are also 100% UV absorptive and are available with polarization to cut out glare in windows, from roads, and on water. A clip-on sunglass may be needed over photochromic lenses while you are driving since car windows typically block the ultraviolet light needed to darken photochromic lenses. A newer lens technology, the Drivewear lens by Younger Optics, is both a polarized and photochromic lens that can respond to changes in lighting even behind car windows.
  
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Polarized. Polarized sunglasses filter out glare and reflections off of flat surfaces, making them an attractive lens feature for virtually everyone who treks outdoors on sunny days. Driving, fishing, golf, and skiing are a few of the activities where polarized lenses add significant visual comfort over conventional sunglasses. Polarized sunglasses can be worn easily in lower light situations, forests, tunnels and in the low light levels late in the day. We recommend polarized lenses with antireflective coating to further enhance optical quality.
 
Tinted lenses without polarization (left) do not reduce glare from reflected light. Polarized lenses (right) are tinted and eliminate bothersome reflections from shiny surfaces like windshields, snow, and water.
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Progressive Add Lenses (PALs). No line bifocal lenses allow you to focus in the distance, mid-range (computer), and closer for reading. As you naturally look from the distance to reading material up close, the lenses adjust your focus for you. There is a gradual change in power from top distance to the lower reading area of the lens. This provides focusing power for multiple focal points over an extended range of distances compared to bifocal or trifocal lenses. Newer advanced designs incorporate high-definition digitally surfaced lens technology, which widens the usable reading area, and enhances overall visual comfort by reducing the peripheral distortion and blur inherent to older PALs. We have had tremendous success with Vision Source’s proprietary TruClear HD PAL. Our opticians will guide you in the best choice for your prescription and visual needs.
fig. a  fig. b 
(fig. a) A trifocal lens has distinct areas for distance, intermediate and close vision. These are obvious to the wearer and the observer. (fig. b) A progressive lens is a multifocal lens with gradual transition in focal powers from distance to near vision. There is no line visible.
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Scratch Resistance. Plastic lenses are highly susceptible to scratches. Special coatings can be applied to any plastic lenses that make the lenses more resistant to scratches resulting from normal use. At Issaquah Vision, we feel that scratch resistant coatings are so important that this coating is included in even our basic lens package.
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UV Protection. Ultraviolet protection is an important feature of your spectacle lenses, blocking radiation that can increase the risk for certain eye conditions such as cataract, macular degeneration and eyelid cancers with chronic exposure. Certain lenses such as photochromic lenses and traditional sunglass lenses provide ultraviolet protection due to the filtering effects of the tinted lens. Clear lenses can have an ultraviolet protective treatment applied as well. We recommend ultraviolet protection as a general eye health benefit especially if you are active outdoors.
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