The Importance of Blinking

Blinking is something that we all do, but did you know about the importance of blinking? The truth is, blinking helps to clean the surface of the eye. The eye is very easily infected, and if we didn’t have the eyelid there to help keep it clean we would develop eye infections much more often. Blinking also helps to flush fresh tears and nutrients across the surface of the eye, this helps to keep it from getting dry.

The average person blinks 24 times per minute, but this number drops drastically when using a digital device. While we use digital devices our blinks per minute drops to around 10, that is over a 50% percent drop! This can cause the eyes to get strained, sore, and dry.

Due to the liquid nature of your eye, it is susceptible to collecting dust and debris. Blinking helps to clean the ocular surface of this debris, so when you blink half as much you aren’t cleaning your eyes as much as is necessary. Over time this can cause damages to the surface structures of your eye.

The tears your eyelids use to clean your eyes are gathered mostly on the lower eyelid, so to clean your eye correctly, you need to close your eyes completely when blinking. Believe it or not, it is quite possible that you might not be blinking correctly. You can test to see if you’re blinking correctly, simply rest your forefinger sideways under your eye just above your cheek bone. When you blink the eyelashes on your upper eyelid should gently brush your finger.

Try it out! But most of all, don’t forget to blink!