Presbyopia affects everyone. Throughout our lives we gradually lose our ability to focus up close. Young children can focus on objects just a couple inches from their face. Teenagers can read something a few inches from their nose. College students see clearly at less than a foot away. By forty years of age, however, books must be held farther back to be read comfortably. The eyes didn’t suddenly go bad at forty. The eye had been gradually losing the ability to focus since birth due to growth of the lens inside the eye and a resulting loss in flexibility.
Category Archives: Diseases
C3R Treatment for Keratoconus
Many LASIK and refractive surgeons are now using Corneal Collagen Crosslinking with Riboflavin (C3R) as a treatment for patients with keratoconus. Recent evidence and studies are showing that Corneal Collagen Crosslinking with Riboflavin (C3R) strengthens the corneal structure and can help prevent the progression of keratoconus. C3R works by increasing collagen crosslinking, giving the cornea greater ability to withstand degeneration that occurs in diseases such as kerataconus. The newly strengthened cornea protects against the bulging out and becoming steep and irregular, consequence of advanced keratoconus.
Embryonic Stem Cells to Cure Age-Related Macular Degeneration
News has been released through Reuters in an article by Ben Hirshler that British scientists are planning to use embryonic stem cells to cure age related macular degeneration, a common form of blindness. They are hoping to have the first patients receive test treatments within five years. This could be a major improvement in the methods of treating this common form of eye blindness that is experienced by millions of individuals throughout the world. Embryonic research could lead to treatments in other forms of blindness as well, such as corneal transplants and keratoconus.
There are also thoughts that perhaps embryonic stem cell research could lead to improvements in cataract surgery allowing patients to focus through a natural lens and see at both distance and near. Such an improvement would rejuvenate the vision of older patients and could conceivably be used as an alternative to LASIK eye surgery, replacing the need to reshape a person’s eye using an excimer laser.
Derek Fisher’s comments to save hundreds of eyes per year from Retinoblastoma
It seems incredulous that an NBA athlete’s post-game comments could actually amount to something very important. You usually don’t hear things that can save your child’s eye from being removed because there is another solution available for children with retinoblastoma.
It seems incredible, yet that is what happened when Utah Jazz guard Derek Fisher arrived in time to play the last portion of a championship game in Salt Lake City, Utah. Derek Fisher, who arrived in time to help win the game and make a few post-game comments, probably didn’t realize that impact that his comments might have.
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Presbyopia (Old Eyes) Vision Correction
Presbyopia is the term for the diminishing ability to focus on up-close objects with age. While the ability to focus on near objects grows progressively worse beginning at birth, it is often first noticed at age 40 when the near focus is approximately 40 cm. Since this is a standard reading distance, it is this age that people most often feel that they are losing there near vision. In fact, the ability to focus has grown progressively worse since childhood.
Consider this. A ten year old can focus clearly on a book located 7 cm from his face while a twenty-five year old must now hold the book 10 cm from his face. The loss of 3 cm of focus may be hardly noticeable but is equivalent to a loss of four diopters of focusing ability. As the person ages another fifteen years and loses another four diopters of accommodation, they can now focus at a distance of 16 cm for short periods of time and comfortably for long periods of time at about 33 cm. The forty year old will begin to notice that near vision is not as easy as it once was.
What options are there in correcting near vision? Continue reading