It emerges in normal individuals after the age of 40. The flexibility of the eye lens changes with age. The lens, which is very flexible in childhood, loses this characteristic over the years and becomes almost completely inflexible by the age of 60. As the lens hardens, focusing on different distances becomes more difficult.
As age advances, the eye can focus on objects at a greater distance, but struggles to focus on nearby objects on the retina. Therefore, in a healthy eye, the closest point seen clearly is approximately 17 cm at around 20 years old, whereas after the age of 40, it is approximately 40 cm.
Age-related vision impairment is initially not very noticeable. There is difficulty in focusing on small letters in artificial light. The patient later starts to have difficulty reading texts up close. After a while, it is noticed that the writings can be read more comfortably when the newspaper is moved away. However, reading small-font texts becomes difficult at this point.
