Is Seeing Floaters Always a Cause for Concern?

There are a wide range of common issues that can affect your eyes and lead to minor problems, such as allergies, dust getting in your eyes, or staring for long periods of time. Whether you have irritated, dry, red, itchy, crusty, gooey, burning, or watery eyes, these are often minor issues that can be treated easily to restore normal vision. Other nuisances can affect your vision and are bothersome, but aren’t a big problem, like floaters.

Many of us have seen floaters in our line of vision, and probably wondered what caused them, but they cleared up quickly, so we dismissed them. But, is there reason to be worried about eye floaters? Let’s find out by exploring what they are, what causes them, and when you should be concerned about them.

If you live in the Muncie, Indiana, area and you’re struggling with floaters or other eye problems, Dr. Jeffrey Rapkin and his experienced medical team at Retina Consultants of Muncie can help.

Defining eye floaters

Eye floaters, or myodesopsias, are black, gray or transparent specks, strings, cobwebs, or other odd shapes floating in your line of vision that often drift and move with your eye movements. They appear more readily when you’re looking at brighter objects or backgrounds, such as a white wall, blue sky, or a blank piece of paper. While they do often move as your eyes do, they tend to settle down and drift out of vision over time.

Common reasons for floaters

Floaters move about in our vitreous humor, the gel-like substance that comprises the largest section of our eyes. We see their shadows when they pass in front of our macula (the part of our retinas that allow for focused vision). This happens for a few different reasons, such as diabetes-related retinopathy, uveitis (inflammation of the eye), injury in the eye, the aging process, and nearsightedness (myopia). 

Conditions to be concerned about

In many cases, eye floaters are easy to manage. However, when they’re accompanied by other signs, like flashes of light, loss of peripheral vision, eye pain, or blurred vision, you should seek medical help as soon as possible because you could be experiencing:

• Vitreous detachment: your vitreous shrinks away from your retina and can detach

• Vitreous hemorrhage: bleeding in your eye due to injury, leaking blood vessels, or infection

• Retinal tear: your vitreous humor pulls on your retina and rips it 
• Retinal detachment: if the rip isn’t managed properly or in enough time, it can completely tear from the retina and cause complete loss of vision

Eye floaters are strange, but aren’t always a serious problem. With other more concerning symptoms, they can be indications of serious vision issues, so reach out to Dr. Rapkin and our team at Retina Consultants of Muncie today for a comprehensive evaluation. You can call now or request an appointment online.