Contact Lenses in Nashville

Our patients appreciate the many contact lens options at Music City Optical. You may prefer contact lenses to glasses for several reasons: vision correction without the hassle of keeping up with glasses, being unrestricted when wearing non-prescription sunglasses and goggles, or maybe you just like a glasses-free appearance. 

If you have a high prescription or astigmatism, contact lenses can provide great vision and superior peripheral vision over glasses. At our office, if you wear multifocal progressive glasses, we offer multifocal contacts and multifocal toric contacts.

Dr. Connie James will prescribe the best contact lenses for you based on a comprehensive eye examination and a thorough review of your visual needs for your activities, whether work or play. Since many people can wear more than one lens type, it is important for the doctor to tell what is best for your prescription and vision care needs. 

The first choice when considering contact lenses is which lens material will best satisfy your needs. There are different types of contact lenses, based on type of lens material and purpose:

Types of Lenses  

Hydrogel (Soft) lenses – are made from gel-like, water-containing plastics called hydrogels, which allow more oxygen to the eye than older hard lenses. Increased initial comfort. Soft lenses take less time to get used to, are more stable and move less, and are ideal for sports. These lenses are comfortable to wear and must be replaced monthly, weekly, or daily depending on the type you choose. Soft lenses are often recommended for sports because they fit closer to the eye and are more difficult to dislodge. They can provide correction for most prescriptions, including astigmatism. 

Silicone Hydrogel (Soft) lenses are an advanced type of soft contact lenses that are more porous than regular hydrogel soft lenses and allow even more oxygen to reach the cornea. Introduced in 2002, silicone hydrogel contact lenses are now the most popular lenses prescribed in the United States.

PMMA lenses (Hard Contacts) have virtually been replaced by Gas Permeable lenses and are rarely prescribed today. We do not prescribe these at Music City Optical. These old-fashioned hard contacts are made from a transparent rigid plastic material called polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA), which also is used as a substitute for glass in shatterproof windows and is sold under the trademarks Lucite, Perspex, and Plexiglas. PMMA lenses have excellent optics, but they do not transmit oxygen to the eye and can be difficult to adapt to.

Gas Permeable – are rigid contact lenses that appear and feel like PMMA lenses but are porous and allow oxygen to pass through them. Because they are permeable to oxygen, GP lenses can be fit much nearer to the eye than PMMA lenses, making them more comfortable than the old-fashioned hard lenses. GP contacts can often provide sharper vision and be more durable than soft and silicone hydrogel contacts, especially if you have astigmatism. It usually takes some time for your eyes to adapt to gas-permeable lenses when you first begin wearing them, but after this initial adjustment period, most people find GP lenses are as comfortable as hydrogel lenses.

Bifocal and Multifocal Lenses – In both soft and GP designs, bifocal and multifocal lenses offer patients both distance and near vision correction, similar to a pair of bifocal and multifocal glasses.  These contact lenses address presbyopia (Age 40+) by offering both distance vision correction and near vision correction. True Multifocal lenses offer three focal points: Up-close, Intermediate, and Distance correction.

Color Contact Lenses – Enhance your eye color by making green eyes greener, for example. Color contact lenses can even change your eye color completely. They are fun and come in a variety of colors for both light and dark eyes.

Scleral Contact Lenses – These specialty firm lenses combine the sharp vision of Gas Permeable with the comfort of soft lenses. These Large-diameter gas permeable lenses are prescribed for select patients, including those with corneal diseases like keratoconus, post-surgical scars, or dry eyes.