Contact Lenses

The birth of contact lenses dates back to Leonardo da Vinci, who noted an optic continuum between the inner surface of the water in a glass sphere and the outer surface of the cornea, when immersing the latter in the first. At a later time, in 1636, Cartesio published “The Dioptrics”, in which he perfected Leonardo’s idea. He explained that a tube filled with water and placed on the cornea, ending with a lens which perfectly matches the cornea, is able to cancel or reduce the eye’s refractive anomalies.

“Modern” contact lenses date back to the discoveries of A.E.Fick, E. Kalt, A.E. Muller, in Switzerland, France and Germany, respectively. These lenses were made of a glassy material and placed on the sclera. They had a big diameter and were poorly physiologically tolerated. The first plastic lenses were created by two American researchers, Dallos and Fleinbloom. Considerably lighter than glass ones, their advantages are immediate. The first hard corneal contact lenses were manufactured in 1950, their diameter was smaller than the cornea’s one and they had been designed by Bier. In the early ’60s two Czechoslovakian researchers, Lim and Wichterle, designed the first soft contact lenses, made with idrogel. In the late ’60s also hard hortocheratologic lenses began to be used. They were designed and applied with the aim to modify the corneal profile during the day in order to reduce myopia. Hortocheratologic lenses attain in 2002 the Food and drugs Administration approval for the correction of myopia up to 6 dioptres, with a maximum of 1.75 of astigmatism. Today hortocheratologic lenses use super permeable to oxygen materials and they are used for corrective purposes only during sleep. Hard lenses and gas permeable ones are nowadays almost completely abandoned because soft lenses can correct ametropias up to 15 dioptres. In our stores you can find all types of soft corneal lenses, made by idrogel and hyaluronic acid, capable of satisfying every need of the myopic, hyperopic, astigmatic or even farsighted customer! Our qualified staff will help you choosing both the most appropriate cleaning liquid and lenses, among daily, bi-weekly, and monthly ones and will support you during the first applications. />