Bates method

The Bates method is a controversial system of eye exercises that is intended to improve vision. It was first described in 1920 by William Horatio Bates in a book entitled Perfect Sight Without Glasses.

Bates Method
This article is part of the branches of CAM series.
CAM Classifications
NCCAM:	Biologically Based Therapy that is centered around exercising the eye in order to improve vision.
Modality:	Self-care
Knowledge:	Pseudoscience
Culture:	Western

The Bates method emphasizes the practice of deliberate eye movements ("swinging"); cupping or palming the eyes with the hands; attempting to see or visualize perfect black; and exposing the eye to as much full daylight as possible.

Bates maintained that the eye focusses, not by the action of the ciliary muscles on the crystalline lens, but by varying elongation of the eyeball caused by the extraocular muscles. The eyes of some animals do, in fact, focus in this way, but the theory that human eyes do is rejected by mainstream biology and medicine.

The common procedure of eye dilation used during eye examinations provides evidence for the mainstream position. Dilation involves the use of eyedrops containing a drug which temporarily relaxes the ciliary muscles. The result is that the eye cannot accommodate at all. The eyes can still be moved to look in different directions, showing that the drug has not affected the external muscles of the eye. Therefore, if the Bates theory were correct, accommodation should still be possible. Bates supporters maintain that the method works regardless of the soundness of its theoretical underpinnings.

Martin Gardner, in Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, characterized Bates' book as "a fantastic compendium of wildly exaggerated case records, unwarranted inferences and anatomical ignorance." He suggested that the Bates method may however work, to a limited degree, by increasing the trainee's ability to interpret and extract information from blurred images.

Detractors concede that most of the Bates exercises are harmless, apart from the possibility that faith in the Bates system could deter people with eye conditions requiring prompt care from seeking conventional treatment. (One of his original exercises, however, involved looking directly at the sun, which is very dangerous; a 1940 revision of his book modified by suggesting that the sun shine on closed eyes).

As of 2004, the growing interest in alternative medicine has led to an increase in the popularity of the Bates system and other methods of visual training through Eye exercises.

Eye exercises are used to assist in some vision problems. What kinds of problems can be treated and the effectiveness of such treatment are controversial. Broadly speaking, three points of view can be identified:

• Traditional mainstream ophthalmologists and optometrists use eye exercises to treat a limited range of problems, particularly problems involving muscular imbalances and problems with coordination of eye movement between the two eyes.
• Functional optometrists and optometric vision therapists are licensed, credentialed doctors of optometry, who specialize in treatment that involves eye exercises. They hold that such exercises are useful in improving a wide range of visual conditions, including focussing problems. The methods used are said to be backed by clinical studies and publications in peer-reviewed journals.
• Advocates of the Bates method and other systems that can be categorized as alternative medicine. Like homeopathic medicine, the treatments used and the explanations of how they are said to work are rejected by mainstream medicine, despite personal testimony by people who claim to have been helped by such methods.

One particularly controversial area is the usefulness of eye exercises in the treatment of myopia (near-sightedness) and whether the use of eyeglasses makes myopia progressively worse.

The alternative medicine position can be outlined as follows:

If a baby does not start walking at the normal age, we do not give him or her a wheelchair. Eventually, through practice, the expected outcome is achieved, with the legs becoming stronger. It has been said that for eyes, the wheelchair route (glasses) has been used instead of exercising.

Like legs, eyes have muscles. For example, a muscle that controls the lens allows a person to change focus between things that are near and things that are far. A myopic person, whose eye muscles became weak from looking at close objects such as books and computer screens, could use exercises to strengthen these muscles.

For example, it is good practice to look away from the computer screen or book every few minutes and look at something in the distance. This helps keep eye muscles toned. There are also specific programs for eye exercises, such as the Bates method. The Tibetan eye chart has long been used for this purpose. There are also acupressure techniques that can be used to improve vision and increase circulation to the eyes. Chinese school children do this every day in a way that resembles a calisthenics class.

The mainstream objection to this argument is that the ciliary muscles which control focussing contract to focus on near objects and relax to focus on distant objects. It is near focussing, not far, that exercises these muscles. Thus, the effect of weakened eye muscles ought to be farsightness (hypermetropia) rather than nearsightness (myopia). The negative lenses that are used to correct myopia cause the muscles to work harder than they would otherwise need to and might, if anything, be expected to strengthen them. Accommodation to distant objects is a passive process and does not involve the use of muscles. In distant accommodation, the ciliary muscles simply relax; accommodation results from the elastic action of the suspensory ligaments and the lens of the eye itself. Therefore it is difficult to see how strengthening the ciliary muscles could improve distant vision.