With Women’s History Month behind us and Mother’s Day right around the corner, Prevent Blindness has continued to show some love to the ladies by reminding them to take care of their eyesight this month. The organization declared April as Women’s Eye Health and Safety Awareness Month to highlight the different needs in addressing women’s eye health. According to Prevent Blindness, women often make the majority of their family's health care decisions; in addition to being responsible for their own health, women are often responsible as caregivers for the health care choices of their children, partners, spouse and aging parents.

In an effort to create awareness to various eye diseases that women are more prone to have than men, Prevent Blindness dedicated the month of April to educating women about these issues, and providing resources and recommendations on the best ways to take care of women’s vision. As VMail previously reported, OCuSOFT Inc., a long-time Prevent Blindness partner, will support Women’s Eye Health and Safety Awareness Month with a donation to Prevent Blindness.

Prevent Blindness stated that women have higher rates of eye diseases such as cataract, glaucoma, and age-related macular degeneration than men. In addition, women tend to have a higher rate prevalence of dry eye and may often deal with vision changes related to both pregnancy and menopause.

The National Eye Institute also stated that women deal with greater instances of eye disorders, in part, due to the fact that they tend to live longer than men, are more likely to undergo cancer treatments which affect vision, and experience age-related hormonal changes that can affect the eyes.

As with other national programs, ECPs from across the nation played their part in creating awareness for the eye health and safety campaign through social media. As the month of April winds down, here is a small compilation of posts from Instagram marking Women’s Eye Health and Safety Month.