Normally, it is only people who wear glasses who have their eyes checked regularly. It should be mandatory say every ten years to be able to perform a basic sight test.

Could it become EU legislation or is that not permissable ? Love it to be the case here.

Is this thread sponsored by Specsavers? :) I had my eyes checked a few months ago, at a local optician. He found scaring of one cornea, probably caused before birth. There were huge numbers of tests, far more thorough than Spesavers. Aging means I have the usual reduced near vision, and I also have early stage cataracts, all quite normal for my age. A few years ago Specsavers supplied some new glasses, and the prescription was wrong. So they checked my eyes, and found one cornea was swelling. It turned out I had splinters in the eye from a gardening accident months earlier. They were very good, phoned the hospital, and I had the splinters removed the same day. They retested my eyes, and redid the prescription. The only problem with Specsavers is the poor selection of frames, if you don't like their current styles. I went to an independent optician as they had a wider range of frame styles. I think it is obvious when eyesight is not good, and each driver should be responsible.

Specsavers optometrists work on either a 20 or 25 minute 'testing slot'. It is difficult to conduct a thorough eye test in this time unfortunantly

Great story - we are all different.

No, no involvement from Specsavers - I'm an independent free spirit.

I wish everbody would take responsibility.

A few years ago, I had visions of lights or stars falling in sheets in front of my eyes after having a paricularly bad headache. There was a possibility of a minor CVA and Bp was high-ish, so My GP arranged an urgent appointment with an eye specialist who took some photos of the back of the eyes and did a complete assessment, this was followed up rapidly by an appointment with a consultant eye specialist in hospital where some dye was injected into my blood and then my eyes photographed and scanned.

After all this and diagnosis was of some macular degeneration, and a lifestyle change lowered blood pressure,(no bp reducing drugs! Hurrah!)

Stabilised, and the fabulous experience of high quality "tailored" varifocals @ £400 a pop has done the trick. Also have an annual eye test as Dad had glaucoma/diabetes, but clear of all that.

I do not enjoy driving at night, but cope.

I fully agree that eye testing should be done, I would think with the current photocard renewal could be a good starting point and then at the suggested renewal times after 70 years of age. Funnily enough, received my invitation for a test today......

An old friend was stopped by police after an accident (not his fault) and they asked him to read the numberplate of the white car further along the road, and then said no, that's wrong, till he pointed out that the car they were asking him to read was cream and the white car was further away, sfter which he read the number plate of the cream car. He was 85 at the time and had better eyesight than plod! I loved that!

I'm assuming dietary advice was given to you with regards to your AMD?

A good 'anti-reflective' coating should make things easier but if you paid £400 I can only assume you already have a coating on your varifocals?

You can easily check the quality of your coating - take your glasses off and under a light move your glasses around with the lenses facing up. There will be a residual hue from the coating. The brighter the green, the cheaper the quality of the coating.

Good quality coatings will give you a dull green/blue/purple colour (depending on the angle your lens makes with the light above)

Yes, every couple of years, as I wear glasses for VDU use at work the employer pays, and I keep a spare pair of glasses in the car at all times (it's legal requirement in some contries)

I understand anyone who is diabetic is entitled to free eye tests, but cannot vouch for that.

Yes, being diagnosed with diabetes qualifies.

The conditions for free eye tests are described here:

http://www.nhs.uk/chq/Pages/895.aspx?Category**=68&SubCategory**=157

I have thin plastic varifocal reactolites with titanium frames and paid less than £300 in the UK..

I had may no reference to statistics, not considering them relevant to this. Purely common sense ? If people who are unfit to drive are not allowed then surely that must be helpful.

Anyone hurt by an accident is not interested in the statistical probability that it would have happened.

It also seems clear that there are people ( I know of one) who are too selfish to stop driving.

I think Ordovices's point, although made elliptically, is that statistics and their analysis make little sense in this area.

Avant, I like this erudite term. I guess it may mean that Ordo is not presenting a circular argument? :-(

Pleased to hear it, shame for the piggy bank.

Impossible to answer question - how many are not O.K. to drive ?

People are different, the age police don't take this into account. There is a 95 year old lady in Wales giving driving lessons successfully,want to tell Stirling Moss he's too old to drive? Granted you should have your eyes tested regularly and if the optician dosen't tell you your eyes are not good enough to drive then only you will know if you can concentrate well enough to drive safely.

Judging by the number of "grace & favour" Rovers (yes that long ago) he wrote off, it's about time people used a different example of driving ability

I agree barney that it is individual. However, there should be checks (at any age) to ensure that people are fit to drive. The consequences are too serious to have what, in my opinion, is a too slack system of controlling safety on the roads.

The eyesight check is just one example of a way to tighten up. There are a number of others, but that would need other threads. Unfortunately, until there is the political will improvements will not come.