Mellisa Cotton, who first reported her own Avaira® Toric contact lens problems to eFoodAlert on September 5th, posted the following comment earlier today:
As if this could not get any worse!!! I was one of the first posts regarding a severe corneal abrasion that I went to the ER for on September 4th. I was wearing the Avaira lenses.
Last evening my husband came home and said he must have pink eye. He’d taken out his lenses earlier because his vision was hazy. His eye were both totally red and hurt–he said he felt like he had sand in both eyes. I said it didn’t look like pink eye but he was hurting and went to bed. This morning the eyes were bad so he went to the doctor. She told him both eyes were very swollen and irritated and prescribed steroid drops. I was unaware until this afternoon that he had been wearing a new pair of lenses for the last week. They are COOPERVISION PROCLEAR MULTIFOCAL. I understand these are not recalled yet. Please, can you get the word out?
Mellisa Cotton
Atlanta, GA
CooperVision acknowledged this morning in a news release that it had received some reports of “severe eye pain” associated with its recalled Avaira® Toric contact lenses. But the problems experienced by wearers of the company’s lenses extend far beyond the Avaira® brand.
In addition to the brands identified in public recall notices around the world – Avaira®, Encore100®, BioComfort XO and Lent Soft 4 Air Tórica – consumers are reporting eye irritation and injuries as a result of wearing CooperVision ProClear, Frequency55, and UltraFlex55 contact lenses.
ProClear and Frequency55 are CooperVision brands. The UltraFlex brand belongs to Ocular Sciences, Inc. As I reported on October 3rd, John Fruth, the founder and former Chairman of Ocular Sciences, was President of CooperVision’s contact lens division before he founded Ocular Sciences. And the mailing address of one of Ocular Sciences’ manufacturing locations is right around the corner from CooperVision Manufacturing Ltd.’s UK production facility in Eastleigh, England.
How much longer will consumers be kept in the dark about the magnitude of this contact lens safety issue?
eFoodAlert 
I have always loved my Proclear Multifocals. So far this year, I have had the right eye contacts tear before the month was up. This has happened 3 times and the contacts are very expensive from my doctor. Is there a recall? Are these contacts defective??? I would like to have these replaced!
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I got my first contact lenses ever in the fall of 2010. I got the Frequency55 torics. The very first time I put them in my eye, about half hour later I got cloudy vision. A day later it got better. Since then I have learned to expect this every time I put in new lenses. However, last month I got a scratch on my eye after putting in new lenses. Now I find that there is a reason for the cloudy vision with new lenses and I find that I have been putting this “residue” in my eyes for over a year. Gross!! Not cool.
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My daughter has also had problems with the Proclear lenses. They replaced one box for us, but even the new ones are troublesome. I don’t believe there are any other manufacturers of the lenses in the powers that she requires, so this is very disconcerting. I would like to see Cooper resolve this issue.
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I have worn contacts for many years without any problems.I have my eyes tested & then purchase a one year supply. This last year I had so many problems with my contacts. I often had blurry vision & often had to remove my lenses because of the discomfort they caused. My eyes also had a discharge that made it impossible to wear contact lenses. I also had three lenses tear. I never had these problems in the past. I am so angry that the place I bought them never alerted me. I knew the lenes were causing my discomfort but I couldn’t understand why.I will never ever purchase COOPERVISION LENSES again. Nor will I ever do business with Stantons, the place I purchased them.
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My daughter has been complaining about her PROCLEAR TORIC lenses for a few months. The left lenses are uncomfortable and they tear almost immediately. These are very expensive lenses and they have caused her discomfort. She even got pinkeye at one point. She has worn lenses for 7 years without incident until these recent boxes of lenses. They are going to put her in the Frequency 55 to see if they are better, but now that I’ve read this information, I’m concerned that we’ll continue to have problems. Has anyone experienced similar problems?
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I too have suffered from the Cooper Vision Proclear multifocal toric lenses. I went to the eye doctor in January 2012 because I could not see out of my contacts. Further investigation revealed that my corneas were severely scratched. I have used steriod drops, erthyromin salve in my eyes and am currently taking an oral antibiotic to heal them. My eye doctor does not think the contacts caused the problem but I am not wearing this brand and will never again. In addition to the eye problems I have been experiencing terrible allergy attacks that I never had before wearing these contacts. I have been wearing them since the fall of 2010. I think the company had better do something soon.
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Did you sue CooperVision and got your money and damages and pain and suffering back at least? I hope you did that. I wish those managers at CooperVision who saw the problems and were hiding their heads in the sand trying to pretend nothing is happenning because they can lose their jobs – I hope they not only do lose their jobs but also would pay some personal fines out of their own pockets to all the sufferers of their wrongful actions! ProClear had issues and recalls a couple of years back – so it looks like nothing has changed since that!!!!
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I have the proclear contacts too and had the same problem as Kim. My cornea was scratched, had to spend a fortune at the eye doctor and on medicine for my eyes and glasses and can’t wear contacts again for awhile. I thought it was allergies or overtiredness, but come to find out it is the contact.
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I knew nothing about the recall and I wore my contacts for ONE day and took them out before bed. I woke up at 3 in the morning with unbearable eye pain and had my husband take me to the ER the next day because I could not take the pain anymore. I ended up having to go to another eye dr the next day and several times after that because of a scratched cornea and swollen, red eye. I bought the Coopervision PROCLEAR EP lenses which I had never used before. It was a new lens the dr had me try. I have been wearing lenses for 20 years and never had this problem before. AFTER this happened I just began looking on the internet and discovered the recall. It makes me sick that they knew about this and did not inform anyone. They told me a may now never be able to wear contacts again!
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I would like to respond to Melissa Cotton’s experience/post. I have been having trouble with the ProClear MultiFocal lenses since January 2011. Unfortunately, no one will listen to me. I returned two separate orders of the ProClears to my eye doctor and they basically wrote me off as a complainer. I found a new eye doctor and he was at least willing to listen. I took my entire collection of ProClear lenses into his office and he asked me to put in a fresh pair so he could check my vision. The first lens we opened was only half there! It had been ripped in half and packaged that way. I believe there are some very serious manufacturing and quality control issues at CooperVision and they appear to be hiding from them rather than facing them and resolving them. They are ruining their reputation.
One interesting aspect I found was that when working with my initial eye doctor, she would order me a set of trial contacts to wear. They were perfect. Then she would order the full package of contacts and the problems would recur. I wonder if the manufacturer and/or location for the trial contacts is different than for the boxed/packaged contacts. The vision problems I experienced were blurry vision, scratchy, dry, uncomfortable contacts, headaches and general eye discomfort. I am grateful that I did not have to go through a corneal abrasion to figure out that I am done with CooperVision contacts. It would really be helpful, and the responsible thing to do, for CooperVision to release information regarding the residue that is causing the problems, if they even know.
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Again, this sounds absolutely aweful, but I would check these guys out:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/keller-rohrback-llp-announces-investigation-of-avaira-toric-contact-lenses-manufactured-by-coopervision-inc-2011-10-12
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There seems to be a new reluctance by regulators to notify consumers of recalls – I have also been monitoring your articles on Listeria in cantaloupes and google news on the subject. As far as I can determine no media or regulatory cover has appeared in Canada; but as you know, most Canadians live along the US-Canada border and it is not unusual for Canadians to go shopping in the US or just visit.
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