Digital Eye Strain: An Emerging Lifestyle Disease in COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

COVID-19 pandemic has compelled us to a life which consists of online professional activities, e-learning, etc. The advent of serial waves of this COVID-19 creates the culture of work from home for many professionals and online education replaces the option for conventional classroom teaching for students worldwide. This has resulted in prolonged unhealthy exposure to digital-screen of electronic gadgets such as computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. In this COVID-19 pandemic, during the lockdown and even in the post-lockdown period many health-related complications arise and one among them is 'Digital Eye Strain' (DES) or computer vision syndrome (CVS). The increased usage of digital screens during the lockdown period influenced the frequency of DES. All age groups especially, young adults and students as academic sessions and activities are confined to online classes and examinations have been suffering from it. In this review article, the authors want to highlight the increased phenomena of DES worldwide in the COVID-19 situation. The author has also discussed different risk factors that cause DES; the pathophysiology of DES; and various preventive strategies to combat this modern, lifestyle disease.