How to Clean Hard Contacts

Overview

A hard contact lens, also known as rigid gas permeable contact lens, requires special care for cleaning and disinfecting. The contact lens needs cleaning daily when worn. Proper cleaning and disinfection is required to maintain healthy eyes and avoid infections or other conditions, such as scratching the lens. There are two methods available for cleaning hard contacts. One method uses two bottles, a cleaning solution and a disinfecting solution. The second method uses only one multipurpose bottle of cleaning and disinfecting solution.

Two-bottle Method

Step 1

Wash your hands with a mild bar soap and dry thoroughly.

Step 2

Remove the contact from one eye and place it in the center of the palm with the concave side facing up.

Step 3

Add a few drops of cleaning solution onto the contact lens.

Step 4

Use the tip of a finger on the opposite hand to rub the contact around on the palm and into the cleaning solution.

Step 5

Flip over the contact and repeat the rubbing process on the convex side of the contact lens. The process takes approximately 30 seconds.

Step 6

Rinse the contact lens with conditioning solution for approximately 5 seconds.

Step 7

Fill contact lens case with a disinfection and conditioning solution before adding lens to case. Soak for at least 4 hours prior to removal from case.

Step 8

Remove the contact from the other eye and repeat the cleaning process.

Step 9

Use a separate enzymatic lens cleaner weekly to remove protein deposits from the contact lens.

One-bottle Method

Step 1

Fill the contact lens case with multipurpose solution. Wash your hands and remove the contacts from your eyes.

Step 2

Place the contacts in the lens case. Soak for at least 4 hours.

Step 3

Wash your hands. Remove one contact from the case and place a few drops of multipurpose solution on the contact lens.

Step 4

Rub each side of the lens to clean. Rinse for 5 seconds with solution.

Step 5

Place the contact in your eye. Remove the second contact lens from the case and repeat the process.