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Comment by mikeash | Hacker News Reader

Contacts aren't risk-free either. By choosing to wear them over glasses for sports and social activities, you're making the same basic choice, perhaps with different numbers. (I say this as one who chose contacts over surgery, and I use them exclusively, no glasses.)

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Yes! Many people seem to miss this for whatever reason. There is no risk-free choice if you are unlucky enough to have poor eyesight.

Personal anecdote: I have a retinal scar from an eye infection that was a direct result of wearing contacts. The $2K I spent on LASIK in my early twenties was the best money I've ever spent.

I did a good amount of research and came to the conclusion that the expected value of LASIK outweighed that of contacts over a lifetime. To simplify things a bit, you are trading a one-time risk of a serious post-surgery complication for a risk of a contact-caused eye infection spread out over the remaining years of your life.

> There is no risk-free choice if you are unlucky enough to have poor eyesight.

What's the risk with glasses? Losing/breaking them?

I was evaluated for wavefront LASIK at the Stanford Eye Laser Center and I asked the doctor there specifically about this, because like you I wondered whether LASIK would be lower-risk than wearing contacts for the rest of my life. He said that conditioned on the fact that I had already worn contacts continually for several years without any problems, it probably wasn't true that continuing to wear contacts was a higher risk than LASIK. (I might have gotten LASIK anyway, but it turned out that I have unusually large pupils, which ups the likelihood of bad side effects.)

What's the risk of contacts in sports?

Nothing to do with sports, but contacts in general carry some risk due to things like eye infections.

I have similar setup. For contacts I use "Dailys". They are more expensive but lesser risk of infection. And these workout almost cheaper for those who use contacts occasionally.

Not with proper use. General recommendation is to wear contacts for 10, sometimes 12 hours in a 24 hour period and use supplemental glasses for the rest. Also clean them daily and well.

Sleeping in contacts is also a big no-no.

Wouldn't be surprised if there's a decent amount of anecdata that people don't really adhere to the guidelines.

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