Posted By Chris Abbott I have found that a slightly larger screen (19" - 20") and a postural assessment of the workstation - regarding head position - can help. My assessments go by way of personal preference to the user, what's comfortable, what makes it easier for them to work. I tend to bring up the monitor and angle it so that the person can look directly at the screen (in conjunction with the seat tweaking), not having to tilt their head back to see directly at the screen which sometimes occurs, that makes looking down at the keyboard more acceptable - and natural. As to cost implications - our stance is that if the optician recommends you need glasses for VDU work only, then we will pay for the eye test and the glasses - reasonable cost of course no Giorgio Armani ;) - if the optician recommends that you need glasses for other reasons - normal everyday use - we will pay for the eye-test only.

Posted By Chris Abbott And the bit I missed off was.. personally I think varifocal lenses / bi-focal and contacts are all fine for computer use - provided that the correct amount of breaks are observed, and that the work station is designed for the individual.

Posted By David Waterton Hi thanks for the responses. sorry i should have mentioned that the individual is suffering from consistant headaches and that i have referred them to their optician for his view (no pun intended)

Posted By Martin Gray As a wearer of varifocal glasses and a user of DSE equipment in my job, I am also short sighted, I would make the following personal observations. I orginally had trouble focusing on the written document after working on DSE as a result the optician recommended varifocals for use, I have not encountered any problems since but did it did take a while to get used to the lense and to look down through the lense rather than tilt my head down. The glasses enable me to focus easily at both mid and long distance by looking straight ahead, and close by tilting my eyes down not my head. I have no problems with varifocals and DSE equipment and I am not aware of any of my staff having problems.