Tag Archives: ophthalmology

iPads detect early signs of glaucoma in Nepal eye screening

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Ophthalmology

Using a tablet screening app could prove to be an effective method to aid in the effort to reduce the incidence of avoidable blindness in populations at high-risk for glaucoma with limited access to health care, according to a study released today at AAO 2014, the 118th annual meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. In this study, researchers from the University of Iowa, the University of Maryland, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Michigan and the Tilganga Eye Institute in Nepal used a free peripheral vision assessment app to screen approximately 200 patients in Nepal for glaucoma using an iPad®. The results show promise for screening populations that have limited or no access to traditional eye care and certain ethnic groups that have a high risk of developing the disease.

Glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness worldwide, affecting more than 60.5 million people. The disease can be effectively treated; however, it generally does not present symptoms in its early stages, resulting in many patients being unaware that they suffer from the condition until it progresses to later stages. Early diagnosis can easily be achieved through a routine examination from an ophthalmologist – a medical doctor specializing in the diagnosis, medical and surgical treatment of eye diseases and conditions – or an optometrist. While it is relatively easy for patients with access to regular health care in developed nations to be screened for glaucoma during a routine eye examination, remote and underserved communities have limited or no access to such services, increasing their risk for glaucoma-related blindness.

In order to determine if a screening test using mobile technology could be effectively administered to communities outside of a traditional clinical setting, the research team used the Visual Fields Easy app, which simulates a visual field test on an iPad (1st Generation), to screen more than 400 eyes for glaucoma.

Approximately half of the eyes screened were healthy “control” eyes and the other half were eyes with glaucoma. The researchers compared the screening results to those from the traditional industry standard visual field test, known as the Humphrey SITA Standard 24-2, and found that the two tests agreed between 51-79 percent of the time.

The best agreement was in patients with moderate and advanced visual field loss, while there was less agreement in patients with mild visual field loss. The researchers believe this was due to a high false positive rate for normal controls. While the agreement rate and cost-benefit ratio of the results were not strong enough to support using the method for screening general populations, the researchers believe that conducting screenings using a tablet can be an effective initial screening tool for high-risk groups, such as people of African or Hispanic ancestry, the elderly and people with limited or no access to traditional eye and health care. In addition, the screenings lasted an average of 3 minutes and 18 seconds – less than half the average time needed for the Humphrey SITA Standard test.

“Visual field testing equipment is neither portable nor affordable to some populations around the world, limiting entire regions from accessing health and eye care,” said lead researcher Chris A. Johnson, Ph.D., director of the Visual Field Reading Center at the University of Iowa. “Although not perfect, the tablet glaucoma screening method could make a significant difference in remote locations where populations would not otherwise receive screening at all.”

 

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/284216.php

 

 

World watches as grandfather from Malawi has his sight restored live online

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Ophthalmology

A blind man’s sight-restoring operation was broadcast live around the world at 1.30pm (BST) October 8, 2014 from a hospital in Malawi.

The six minute cataract operation will mean 69-year-old Winesi March could see his baby grandson for the first time when his bandages are removed tomorrow on World Sight Day.

The live online broadcast was hosted by YouTuber Doug Armstrong who fielded questions from the global audience via a Google Hangout. Dr Gerald Msukwa, one of only a few ophthalmologists in Malawi, talked through the simple procedure whichrestores the sight of more than 20 million people around the world every year and is the most commonly performed surgery on the NHS.

Dr Msukwa said:

“I’m a doctor, not a movie star so there is some tension with the world watching but it’s nothing when I know that tomorrow my patient’s life will be utterly changed.

“Yesterday Winesi could not farm his land, see his family or walk to the market without the constant support of his dedicated wife. Tomorrow he tells me he will dance across the river by his home to work. The operation only costs GBP30 but will help him feed his family for years to come.”

The second live broadcast (October 9, 2014) will see the global audience join the team in Malawi for the life-changing moment when Winesi’s bandages are removed and he sees his 18-month-old grandson Luka for the first time.

In the UK more than 50 per cent of adults over the age of 65 have cataract, a condition that causes sight to become blurred and gradually lost. But the majority of the 20 million people blind from cataracts are living in the poorest parts of the world, often unable to access the straightforward surgery.

Winesi’s surgery is the first ‘miracle’ of Sightsavers’ biggest-ever fundraising appeal – A Million Miracles. The charity is aiming to raise GBP30 million to provide one million sight-restoring surgeries for people living in developing countries. All donations made by the UK public will be matched pound for pound by the UK government for the first three months of the appeal.

To watch the online surgery again go to millionmiracles.org

 

Retinal tumors in young children caused by a single, genetic change

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Ophthalmology_Oncology_Pediatrics

Retinoblastoma is a childhood retinal tumor usually affecting children one to two years of age. Although rare, it is the most common malignant tumor of the eye in children. Left untreated, retinoblastoma can be fatal or result in blindness. It has also played a special role in understanding cancer, because retinoblastomas have been found to develop in response to the mutation of a single gene – the RB1 gene – demonstrating that some cells are only a step away from developing into a life-threatening malignancy.

David E. Cobrinik, MD, PhD, of The Vision Center at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA), together with colleagues at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, has answered the long-standing question of why mutations to the RB1 gene primarily cause tumors of the retina and not of other cell types. His study – which could reveal new cellular signaling pathways relevant to retinal development, cancer development, and ultimately, the development of novel therapies – is published in this week’s early on line issue of the journal Nature.

“These findings significantly advance our understanding of cancer, not only because they solve the RB riddle, but also because they more generally imply that cancers can develop through the collaboration between a cancer-causing mutation – in this case, inactivation of the RB1 gene – and cell type-specific circuitry,” said Cobrinik, who also an investigator with The Saban Research Institute of CHLA and associate professor of Ophthalmology at USC Eye Institute, Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California.

The RB1 gene encodes a tumor suppressor protein, referred to as Rb, which prevents excessive cell growth by inhibiting cell cycle progression until a cell is ready to divide. If both alleles of the RB1 gene are mutated early in life, the Rb protein is inactivated, resulting in development of retinoblastoma cancers. (While the Rb protein regulates proliferation in many cell types, only cells in the retina routinely form cancers when the function of the RB1 gene is lost.)

Cobrinik and colleagues discovered that retinoblastomas originate in cone photoreceptor precursors, and their study explains why retinoblastomas originate in these precursor cells. Cone cells, or cones, are one of the two types of photoreceptor cells in the retina, and are responsible for color vision. A cone precursor is an immature cone cell which is not yet fully differentiated.

The study indicates that cone precursors prominently express key, cancer-related proteins that enable proliferation and suppress apoptosis, or programmed cell death. Meanwhile, the role of the Rb protein is to hold back such proliferation – which means that the loss of Rb alone is sufficient to allow unchecked cell proliferation, causing retinoblastomas to form.

“We showed that the cone precursors’ normal developmental program collaborates with RB1 mutations to deregulate cell growth,” Cobrinik explained. “In other words, loss of the RB1 gene results in abnormal proliferation because the cone precursor cells lack a self-monitoring ‘surveillance system’ – which would normally cause aberrantly proliferating cells to undergo apoptosis. Instead, cells are able to divide uncontrollably and eventually become cancerous.”

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/283008.php

 

 

Brain mechanism underlying the recognition of hand gestures develops even when blind

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Ophthalmology

Does a distinctive mechanism work in the brain of congenitally blind individuals when understanding and learning others’ gestures? Or does the same mechanism as with sighted individuals work? Japanese researchers figured out that activated brain regions of congenitally blind individuals and activated brain regions of sighted individuals share common regions when recognizing human hand gestures. They indicated that a region of the neural network that recognizes others’ hand gestures is formed in the same way even without visual information. The findings are discussed in The Journal of Neuroscience (July 23, 2014 electronic edition).

Our brain mechanism perceives human bodies from inanimate objects and shows a particular response. A part of a region of the “visual cortex” that processes visual information supports this mechanism. Since visual information is largely used in perception, this is reasonable, however, for perception using haptic information and also for the recognition of one’s own gestures, it has been recently learned that the same brain region is activated. It came to be considered that there is a mechanism that is formed regardless of the sensory modalities and recognizes human bodies.

Blind and sighted individuals participated in the study of the research group of Assistant Professor Ryo Kitada of the National Institute for Physiological Sciences, National Institutes of Natural Sciences. With their eyes closed, they were instructed to touch plastic casts of hands, teapots, and toy cars and identify the shape. As it turned out, sighted individuals and blind individuals could make an identification with the same accuracy. Through measuring the activated brain region using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), for plastic casts of hands and not for teapots or toy cars, the research group was able to pinpoint a common activated brain region regardless of visual experience. On another front, it also revealed a region showing signs of activity that is dependent on the duration of the visual experience and it was also learned that this region functions as a supplement when recognizing hand gestures.

As Assistant Professor Ryo Kitada notes, “Many individuals are active in many parts of the society even with the loss of their sight as a child. Developmental psychology has been

advancing its doctrine based on sighted individuals. I wish this finding will help us grasp how blind individuals understand and learn about others and be seen as an important step in supporting the development of social skills for blind individuals.”

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/282166.php

 

 

DNA test for congenital cataracts leads to faster, more accurate diagnoses of rare diseases linked to childhood blindness

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Ophthalmology_Pediatrics

Researchers in the United Kingdom have demonstrated that advanced DNA testing for congenital cataracts can quickly and accurately diagnose a number of rare diseases marked by childhood blindness, according to a study published online in Ophthalmology, the journal of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. Using a single test, doctors were able to tailor care specifically to a child’s condition based on their mutations reducing the time and money spent on diagnosis and enabling earlier treatment and genetic counseling.

Each year, between 20,000 and 40,000 children worldwide are born with congenital cataracts, a disease that clouds the lens of the eye and often requires surgery and treatment to prevent blindness.[1] The disease can arise following a maternal infection or be inherited as an isolated abnormality. Congenital cataracts can also appear as a symptom of more than 100 rare diseases, making mutations in the 115 genes associated with congenital cataracts useful as diagnostic markers for the illnesses.

Diagnosing these rare diseases previously proved a lengthy, costly and inconclusive process involving numerous clinical assessments and taking a detailed family history. DNA testing, one gene at a time, would have taken years to complete. Employing new DNA sequencing technology, called targeted next-generation sequencing, researchers at the University of Manchester sped up diagnosis to a matter of weeks by testing for mutations in all 115 known congenital cataracts genes at one time.

In 75 percent of the 36 cases tested, the DNA test determined the exact genetic cause of congenital cataracts. In one case, the DNA test helped diagnose a patient with Warburg Micro syndrome, an extremely rare disease that is marked by an abnormally small head and the development of severe epilepsy, among other medical issues. Having a clear diagnosis allowed for genetic counseling and appropriate care to be delivered quicker than previously possible without the test.

“There are many diseases that involve congenital cataracts but finding the exact reason was always difficult,” said Graeme Black, DPhil., professor of genetics and ophthalmology at the University of Manchester and strategic director of the Manchester Centre for Genomic Medicine. “Even with a family history, diagnosing these rare diseases was always a bit of a shot in the dark.”

In the course of their work, done in collaboration with Manchester Royal Eye Hospital, researchers also found previously undescribed mutations linked to cataract formation. “There is hope that our work may one day provide more insight into the development and treatment of age-related cataracts, a leading cause of blindness worldwide,” said Rachel Gillespie, MSc, lead author of the study who designed and developed the test.

The test was made available to U.K. patients through the country’s National Health Service in December 2013. Infants and children who have congenital cataracts can be tested as well as prospective parents with a history of the condition who wish to evaluate the risk to their child. Results generally take about two months. While only available in the U.K., the congenital cataract DNA test can be requested by registered medical facilities through international referral.

As with all genetic testing, the American Academy of Ophthalmology encourages clinicians and patients to consider the benefits as well as the risks. Ophthalmologists who order genetic tests either should provide genetic counseling to their patients themselves, if qualified to do so, or should ensure that counseling is provided by a trained individual, such as a board-certified medical geneticist or genetic counselor. For more information, please see the Academy’s recommendations on genetic testing for inherited eye diseases.

 

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/281442.php

 

 

 

Slippery material for lubricating joints inspired by nature

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Ophthalmology_Orthopedic Surgery

For some time, scientists have been aware that synovial fluid in joints contains a natural substance that helps keep them well lubricated. Now, by mimicking its properties, engineers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD, hope to develop a new material that delivers long-lasting lubrication in artificial joints, and other specific spots in the body where surfaces move against each other.

The team writes about the new material, and the potential it offers, in the journal Nature Materials. As well as helping to ease joint pain, other areas of possible use include making contact lenses more comfortable.

The molecule they are investigating is called hyaluronic acid (HA), which exists in several forms in the body where lubrication is needed.

One form of HA reduces inflammation and protects cells from metabolic damage. In the body, HA is bound to the surfaces it protects by a protein. Research shows that in damaged, diseased and aging knees, hips, shoulders and elbows, this protein is no longer able to hold onto HA.

Viscosupplementation is a popular treatment for painful joints and consists of injecting HA into the painful joint. However, if the cause of the pain is the lack of the protein that helps bind HA to the affected surface, then it does not offer long-lasting benefit. The injected HA is soon washed away by the body’s natural cleaning processes.

‘Chemical handle’ holds HA in place

Thus, led by Jennifer H. Elisseeff, a professor at the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins, the team sought to find a way to keep HA in place. They found their answer in molecules known as HA-binding peptides (HABpeps).

The scientists used HABpep as a “chemical handle” to attach HA onto natural and artificial surfaces with the help of another synthetic molecule, polyethylene glycol.

In the lab, they tested the new material in cultured tissue and joint and eye surface tissue in live animals. They found the bound HA did not wash away easily, and it reduced friction as well as when the tissues were immersed in a bath of HA:

“Tissue surfaces treated with the HA-binding system exhibited higher lubricity values, and in vivo were able to retain HA in the articular joint and to bind ocular tissue surfaces,” they note.

HABpep holds HA in place 12 times longer

In another set of experiments, they also tested an HABpep designed to attach to cartilage. They injected rats’ knees first with some HABpep, then with some HA, and found the HA stayed in place 12 times longer than it did in rats that had received only HA injections without HABpep.

The team suggests this shows HABpeps may be a useful addition to viscosupplementation by helping the HA to stay in place longer. They also conclude:

“Biomaterials-mediated strategies that locally bind and concentrate HA could provide physical and biological benefits when used to treat tissue-lubricating dysfunction and to coat medical devices.”

Although it will be some time before such a material is ready for use in humans, the team highlights that theirs is yet another example of where nature has inspired the solution to a medical problem.

Prof. Elisseeff, who is also of the Johns Hopkins University departments of Biomedical Engineering and of Materials Science and Engineering, says:

“What I like about this concept is that we’re mimicking natural functions that are lost using synthetic materials.”

Meanwhile in November 2013, Medical News Today learned how another team of researchers – also inspired by nature – is refining sea coral for use in bone grafts.

Written by Catharine Paddock PhD

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/281212.php

 

Age-related macular degeneration occurs much earlier than previously assumed

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Ophthalmology

It is widely accepted that age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the most common cause of visual impairment and blindness in industrialized countries. However, it is questionable whether it can continue to be defined as a disease in people in their 50s and beyond. Investigations to determine the incidence of age-related macular degeneration undertaken as part of the Gutenberg Health Study of the University Medical Center of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) have shown that even persons under the age of 50 years may be affected by an early form of the eye disease. Just under 4 percent of the 35 to 44-year-old subjects in the population-based study were found to be suffering from AMD.

In order to identify the age- and gender-specific incidence of AMD, the research team of the Department of Ophthalmology at the Mainz University Medical Center led by Dr. Christina Korb, PD Dr. Alireza Mirshahi, and Professor Norbert Pfeiffer assessed the status of the ocular fundus of 4,340 participants in the Gutenberg Health Study. Evaluated were vascular structure, the head of the optic nerve, and the macula of the eye, which is the point of sharpest vision. The results in general documented that the incidence of AMD increases with age. However, the researchers also discovered to their surprise that even persons under the age of 50 years can already be affected by early stage AMD. In the age group of 35- to 44-year-olds, 3.8 percent of the subjects in the Gutenberg Health Study were found to be suffering from the disease. The findings of the Mainz researchers thus contradict the current assumption that age-related macular degeneration only occurs in the section of the population that is over 50 years old.

With the help of their findings, the researchers were also able to gain insights into how frequently the various forms of age-related macular degeneration occur. On average, about 12 percent of the examined 35- to 74-year-olds had early stage AMD, but only 0.2 percent of the study participants exhibited symptoms of late stage AMD, which is often associated with severe visual impairment. “Our research shows that age-related macular degeneration can already occur much earlier than previously thought. This means there may also be possible consequences with regard to the screening examinations for these diseases,” concluded Dr. Christina Korb.

Age-related macular degeneration leads to loss of visual acuity. The cause is damage to the cells in the region of the central retina also known as the “yellow spot.” There is still insufficient information on the annual number of individuals who develop AMD and the Mainz-based researchers hope to be able to remedy this with the help of their next project. As the Gutenberg cohort was subjected to a follow-up examination five years after inclusion in the study, the research group has now access to more relevant and reliable data. “The prospective design of the study, in combination with the availability of interdisciplinary research data, should make it possible for us to identify risk factors for the development of late forms of AMD in our cohort. We are looking forward with some excitement to the results,” explained the team. The objective is to reveal, for the first time, the incidence of AMD across the whole population of Germany.

The Gutenberg Health Study (GHS) is an interdisciplinary, population-based, prospective, monocenter cohort study, which has been conducted at the Mainz University Medical Center since 2007. Cardiovascular diseases,cancer, eye diseases, metabolic disorders as well as immune system and mental disorders are being investigated as part of the study. The goal of the study is to improve the individual risk prediction for these diseases. To this end, lifestyle, psychosocial factors, environment, clinical laboratory parameters, and the severity of any subclinical disorder are being taken into consideration. A comprehensive biorepository is being developed so that molecular biological investigations can be conducted. During the baseline visit, 15,010 participants aged 35 to 74 years were invited to participate in a 5-hour examination program at the study center. This was followed by a computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI) using a standardized questionnaire and the assessment of diseases and health problems after 2.5 years. All endpoints will be subjected to extensive validation. In April 2012, a detailed follow-up examination of participants similar to the baseline examination was conducted at the center five years after their inclusion in the study. The aim is to continue to monitor the cohort and conduct further tests.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/279917.php

Picture courtesy of lighthouse.org

 

 

 

Regeneration of retinal ganglion cell axons and gene therapy

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Ophthalmology_Neurology

Because the adult mammalian central nervous system has only limited intrinsic capacity to regenerate connections after injury, due to factors both intrinsic and extrinsic to the mature neuron, therapies are required to support the survival of injured neurons and to promote the long-distance regrowth of axons back to their original target structures.

The retina and optic nerve are part of the CNS and this system is much used in experiments designed to test new ways of promoting regeneration after injury.

Testing of therapies designed to improve RGCs viability also has direct clinical relevance because there is loss of these centrally projecting neurons in many ophthalmic diseases.

Many different approaches are being trialed, targeting different receptor systems and/or different signaling pathways, some aimed at enhancing intrinsic growth capacity in injured RGCs, others aimed at reducing the impact of factors external to the neuron that suppress/restrict the regenerative response.

An approach increasingly of interest involves the use of modified, replication-deficient viral vectors to introduce appropriate genes into injured cells in the visual pathway (gene therapy).

In the perspective article written by Prof Alan Harvey, from School of Anatomy, Physiology and Human Biology, The University of Western Australia, he summarized recent gene therapy research from his laboratory, using the rodent visual system as an experimental model, which is aimed at improving both the viability and regenerative capacity of injured adult RGCs.

These perspectives were published in Neural Regeneration Research (Vol. 9, No. 3, 2014).

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/279274.php

 

Picture courtesy of www.rndsystems.com

 

 

 

Wearable computer gloves ‘help teach braille’

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Ophthalmology

More than 39 million people around the world are blind. For many of these individuals, braille – a reading and writing system that utilizes a series of raised dots that represent letters, numbers and punctuation – is a valuable tool. Now, researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a wearable computer glove that can teach braille, even when the user’s attention is on another activity.

The research team – including Thad Starner, a professor at Georgia Tech and a technical/lead manager on Google’s Project Glass – first created a technology-enhanced glove back in 2008, called Piano Touch. The glove could teach individuals how to play piano melodies in 45 minutes.

Their latest creation is an advancement on Piano Touch, which has been built around a process called passive haptic learning (PHL) – the idea that people can learn a skill unconsciously without devoting full attention to what they are learning.

“We’ve learned that people can acquire motor skills through vibrations without devoting active attention to their hands,” says Tharner.

According to the researchers, only 10% of blind people learn braille. They believe it is something that is largely neglected in schools and note that the system can also be difficult to learn as a person ages, when blindness is most common. But could this new wearable technology help with the braille learning process?

Putting the glove to the test

The team put the new glove to the test in order to see how well the technology could teach braille.

For their study, participants were required to wear the gloves during a series of tasks. The gloves consist of small vibrating motors that are stitched into the knuckles.

In the first task, the motors in the glove vibrated in a sequence that correlated with a typing pattern of a premeditated phrase in braille. The participants were given audio cues that let them know what braille letters were produced through typing that particular sequence.

Each participant was then required to type the phrase once on a keyboard without any vibrations or audio cues while the researchers measured their accuracy.

In the following task, participants were asked to play a computer game for 30 minutes – as a distraction – while wearing the glove. Half of the participants were presented with repeated vibrations and audio cues that represented the same braille phrase as the previous task, while the remaining participants acted as a control group and were only given audio cues.

The researchers note that the subjects had no previous knowledge of braille and the tasks did not include visual feedback, meaning participants were unaware of their accuracy.

Participants ‘could read and write braille’

On comparing the participants’ results with those of the first task, the team found that those in the control group had about the same level of accuracy.

However, those who had repeated vibrations and audio cues in the second task were a third more accurate, with some even gaining perfect accuracy. Furthermore, the researchers found that these participants were then able to effectively go from writing braille to reading it.

“After the typing test, passive learners were able to read and recognize more than 70% of the phrase’s letters,” says study co-author Caitlyn Seim, a student at Georgia Tech.

Seim is now in the process of conducting another study, which involves using the glove to teach the full braille alphabet to participants. She says that so far, 75% of subjects have demonstrated perfect typing accuracy. In addition, participants were able to recognize and read more than 90% of braille letters after 4 hours of learning.

Medical News Today recently reported on another creation for the visually impaired by researchers from Oxford University in the UK – “Smart glasses.” The glasses have been designed to help near-blind users navigate public spaces and better interact with others, as the glasses enhance facial features.

Written byHonor Whiteman

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/278719.php

 

 

 

The American Academy of Ophthalmology offers guidance to help improve public understanding of cataracts

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Ophthalmology

Cataract is one of the leading causes of blindness in the United States. Approximately 24.5 million Americans have the lens-clouding eye condition, and the incidence is set to grow by 50 percent by 2020.[i] As part of its efforts to support Cataract Awareness Month this June, the American Academy of Ophthalmology – the world’s largest association of eye physicians and surgeons – is sharing with the public hundreds of commonly-asked questions and answers about the condition, which affects more than half of all Americans by age 80.[ii]

If not treated through a change in eyeglass prescription or surgery, cataracts can increase risk of permanent blindness. In addition, the longer advanced cataracts are left untreated, the more difficult it can be to successfully remove the cataract and restore vision. To help people understand the condition, its causes and treatments, Academy member ophthalmologists – medical doctors specializing in the diagnosis, medical and surgical treatment of eye diseases and conditions – have responded to hundreds of queries about cataracts submitted by the public through the Ask an Eye M.D. portal onGetEyeSmart.org. The following five questions and answers about cataracts are a small sampling of what is available for public reference on the website:

Can you have 20/20 vision and still be diagnosed with cataract?

“Yes, you can,” answers Jeffrey Whitman, M.D. “Having a cataract just means that the lens of your eye has become cloudy and hardened – a process that begins at around 50 years of age and does not preclude 20/20 vision. It is only when it becomes visually significant – that is, when it degrades your vision, changes color perception, or causes glare at nighttime – that it requires surgical care.”

How can I keep cataracts from getting worse?

“Most individuals over age 50 to 60 technically have age-related changes in their lenses that might be termed ‘very early cataracts,'” says Charles P. Wilkinson, M.D. “In general, prevention is very difficult; but the most helpful practices include:

  • Avoid ultraviolet light from the sun with sunglasses
  • Avoid using steroid eye drops unless absolutely necessary
  • Avoid the rare medications that may be associated with cataract progression, including psoralens, a drug used along with light therapy to treat skin disorders; chlorpromazine, an antipsychotic; and someglaucoma medications.”

Do cataracts cause eye pain?

“Cataracts do not cause pain except if they have been allowed to remain untreated for too long,” explains Wayne Bizer, D.O. “In this case they cause a lot of pain and light sensitivity. Consult your ophthalmologist immediately if you are having eye pain.”

Why do I need to stop wearing my contact lenses before cataract surgery?

“Before cataract surgery, important measurements of the surface of your eye must be taken,” says W. Barry Lee, M.D. “Contact lenses alter the shape of the eye’s surface, which can make the measurements inaccurate and lead to poor vision after the surgery. The length of time you must not wear contact lenses prior to your cataract surgery varies depending on the type of contact lenses you wear, so listen to your ophthalmologist’s instructions carefully.”

How long is recovery time after cataract surgery?

“Typically, this should only take several days,” says Gary Hirshfield, M.D. “Of course, some issues may occur that require a longer recovery period, such as other eye conditions or rare surgery complications. Additionally, if both eyes need to be done and you are significantly near- or far-sighted, then there may be a period of time in between the surgery for each eye where the differences between the eyes may make your tasks difficult. Also, depending upon the surgical approach you may need a change in your eyeglass prescription which is usually done at about four weeks. However that can be accelerated to just several days provided you understand that the prescription may need to be revised in several weeks or months.”

“While cataracts are one of the most common eye conditions – especially for older adults – when and why to seek treatment and what kind can be a complex decision,” said Daniel J. Briceland, M.D., ophthalmologist and clinical spokesperson for the American Academy of Ophthalmology. “Some people wait too long before seeing a doctor about a suspected cataract, but they should really see an ophthalmologist for a comprehensive eye exam. Even if immediate treatment is not required, at least an ophthalmologist can confirm this and have a baseline from which to compare your vision if and when the cataract worsens later on.”

Seniors who have not had an eye exam in the last three years and for whom cost is a concern may qualify for EyeCare America, a public service program of the Foundation of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, which provides eye exams and care at no out-of-pocket cost for eligible seniors age 65 and older through its network of more than 6,000 volunteer ophthalmologists. Visit www.eyecareamerica.org to see if you or your loved ones are eligible.

See all 250 cataract-related questions and answers or submit your own question at www.geteyesmart.org/ask.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/277794.php