What are floaters?

Floaters can be quite an irritating experience. They appear in ones field of vision as tiny spots, wormlike threads, blots or webs, they float across your vision like a dead fly or blurry blot. When sufferers first notice this rather annoying phenomenon, the tendency is to move ones eye around in an infuriating attempt to locate the blot.
Floaters can vary from just a slight nuisance when flicking through your favorite mag to it affecting the concentration of almost every normal daily activity. They can be seen more clearly when looking at open areas of a light background or open sky. Of course the defect is actually within the eye itself, they are not optical illusions but are actually tiny deposits of various size and shape, within the eye's vitreous humour, ( the thick clear gel that fills the eye) Floaters are visible because of the shadows they cast on the retina when light is refracted through the eye.
People who suffer from migraines often see floaters, these can be followed by flashes of light, right before experiencing the migraine. For these people, floaters mean that the sufferer should take that one should take prescribed migraine medication promptly. Taking migraine medication at the earliest sign of a migraine will be far more effective at alleviating the excruciating headaches and numbness that may follow.